Today's thoughts

This day ended up being way too bizarre even for words in my opinion no, seriously all I wanted was the simple switch to replace the one broken on my chair that regulates different like chair speed or recline mode ectra. I thought that I had it possibly fixed the other day but that didn't work out so I decided to take it into ucat to have them work on it they always do a fairly good job. It would also give me some time to spend with my friend Robert.

The Day begin beautifully now that the stormy weather is passed it was nice to be out in the sunshine even if it was chilly. I found a hood that I could wear and made an uneventful trip into the building over at the buffmire center. I was pleased to find Robert in and we immediately started working on the control box that need the switch. I really thought it was going to be a simple ordeal just slide it off and put a new one on. The first Omen that there might be something bad going on today was that Robert alerted me that it would cost $10 which I thought was kind of steep for the piece but I felt it was worth the money if it would make my share easier to handle. Actually it didn't handle too bad but still I wanted to have it all together again even if the price of 10 bucks. We struggled for a minute to trying to get off the piece and eventually he was able to move the piece off the control box and after a few minutes of checking to see other pieces similar from other power chairs they have like mine in the back of the building they found one which after a little struggle did just fine going on but then when we tried to power the chair up something happened and I'm not sure what but something in my chair no longer understood the commands that the control box was given. In fact the control box couldn't even find the rest of the power chair it wouldn't go anywhere. We struggled for the next hour or so trying to get that to work then we tried to replace it with another control box off another chair and it was the same thing and it was the same thing for the rest of the two hours that we spent struggling to find or at least get my chair back to where it was when I came in none of that worked. I hate it when this happens. There's no way to transfer me from one chair to another since there are other chairs there at the building there's just no way to get me into one of them. Finally we decided we had to bite the bullet and somehow get me back home so I can get in my backup chair. Luckily they have a wheelchair accessible van and they put me and my chair into the van we all drove back to my house and put me in the swing and lifted me into my backup chair that's where I'm at now. The back of chairs okay sort of. I was pleased that the chair was charged and seemed ready to go. I've been using this chair for the remainder of the day. Until just a few minutes ago when all the sudden the battery started dropping like a rock I'm now plugged into my chair tilted back waiting for it to charge enough that I can get around and do what I got to do before bedtime. This really freaks me out because I just got brand new batteries in this chair and it's acting like5 it's an old battery. This will not happen. I'll have to struggle in this chair for any amount of time hopefully Robert and the boys will be able to figure out something tomorrow or maybe over the weekend but the way things go I will be surprised this is going to be a burden I hope I can struggle through…

 

Wednesday's ramble

I can't believe tomorrow's Thursday this week is just going way too quick for me. I've been pretty much housebound this week just because of storms in the area. I guess I could have gone out but why? There was no reason to go out no meetings, no movies worth going out in the cold for and I have all the food in my pantry that I can shake a stick at. No need to go to the market just to spend on things I don't need. Supposedly a high pressure system moves in tomorrow storm moves out. Maybe I can get back into some form of normalcy except that the warm weather is pretty much left then I'm going to have to dig out my warmer clothes i.e. jackets, long sleeve shirts and one or two sweaters if I can find them. The only problem is that on close inspection of my clothes I realize that many of them are turning into rags. Rips and tears and holes everywhere especially around the sleeves. It's not the clothes fault it's just that I've had them for maybe decades. Consider my clothes my friends, it's hard to give them up but I think I need to make the step and start going through my closets and get rid of everything I haven't worn for two or three years are things that have so many holes that I look like a hobo. I just have to get over this holding thing and upgrade my wardrobe.

I must have about six stocking knit caps. One of the ladies here at the complex where I live loves to knit and she's got tons of caps as I understand it and I've already received about four or five plus the ones I already had plus I had a couple gifts for Christmas. So I'm trying to wear a different knit cap each day. I really like the ones that are colorful but I also like the dark ones the black ones too that look like a watch cap makes me feel like I belong on a submarine or driving a motorcycle like Bronson wears in his movie. Not that I'm trying to look tough but that wouldn't be bad either. I haven't received any new caps this season and I'm not holding out a lot of Hope I mean after all, how many caps can one wear in any given winter season?

The biggest event of my day, today, was the arrival of a new book. I think I may have talked about this a little bit earlier about I got the middle book of a trilogy that I just finished reading last week. I've ordered the first volume now which came today kind of excites me to have something to look forward to. As the dedicated reader knows I read a few minutes before bed each night. I just started a volume I found upstairs in the library yesterday. It's a novel of course somewhat historic it looks quite entertaining actually. I wasn't expecting the new book to get here for another week or so so I figured I'd be able to get quite a ways into the book before the new book came but that's not going to happen now. Sadly I think I'll have to start the new book and put the other book aside or maybe consider reading the books and tandem but that sounds a little complicated.

 

Free day

No assist meeting today so I didn't have to go in to the city and I'm quite glad it really is feeling like winter out there today. Heavy-duty clouds intermittent rain and temperatures not even close to 50 °. Took a while to get dressed but it was no problem All Things Considered. I listen to a bit of radio and got an early workout on the arm bike and workout done before 12:00 when I watch the local news and weather to see if there's going to be a real break there was not. Just hanging out at the apartment right now so just hovering. My rear end is not feeling the best but I don't think there's any blood or anything like that I just have to keep putting the lotion on and hope for the best continue to do my press releases leaning back in the chair to take the pressure off the rear end. I doubt that going places in my chair like to the bus stop and then to wherever I need to go then back again it is necessarily good for my rear end but I've noticed that when I am doing that it seems like there's less damage at the end of the day when I go to bed and feel those chafed areas and apply the lotion. I really have this unfounded belief that as long as I continue to use the lotion No assist meeting today so I didn't have to go in to the city and I'm quite glad it really is feeling like winter out there today. Heavy-duty clouds intermittent rain and temperatures not even close to 50 °. Took a while to get dressed but it was no problem All Things Considered. I listen to a bit of radio and got an early workout on the arm bike and workout done before 12:00 when I watch the local news and weather to see if there's going to be a real break there was not. Just hanging out at the apartment right now so just hovering. My rear end is not feeling the best but I don't think there's any blood or anything like that I just have to keep putting the lotion on and hope for the best continue to do my press releases leaning back in the chair to take the pressure off the rear end. I doubt that going places in my chair like to the bus stop and then to wherever I need to go then back again it is necessarily good for my rear end but I've noticed that when I am doing that it seems like there's less damage at the end of the day when I go to bed and feel those chafed areas and apply the lotion. I really have this unfounded belief that as long as I continue to use the lotion and the use of liberally both in the morning and the evening that my rear end will be in a lot better situation. If I had the ability to really get out of my chair lunch back on the bed get my pants down and apply more of the though should I be even better but I don't think that's really going to happen that's not very practical especially trying to get back into my chair in regular clothes after I've been on the bed. This was even the case in the older days right after my requin I would sometimes take a nap in the middle of the day after being home for about a year. Not only were the transfers difficult but I was still wearing an external catheter so I had to beware that if I peed the prophylactic that I was using to fix the catheter to my penis my twist or I might fill up the bag itself either way it would end up bursting the prophylactic and drenching myself as well as if wherever I was  down covered in pee. That really only had to happen once  to train me out of that behavior. I watched more flat screen today a couple of movies and finished the limited series. That's a cheap way to spend the day but again my justification is while watching the flat screen I can lower my chair enough to take the weight off the rear end. It's a weak justification but it works for me. There's rain forecast again for tomorrow in the real low pressure system Moves In the temperatures will remain low. So I expect tomorrow's report will be similar to this days but that's okay I'm enjoying my time…..

 the use of liberally both in the morning and the evening that my rear end will be in a lot better situation. If I had the ability to really get out of my chair lunch back on the bed get my pants down and apply more of the though should I be even better but I don't think that's really going to happen that's not very practical especially trying to get back into my chair in regular clothes after I've been on the bed. This was even the case in the older days right after my requin I would sometimes take a nap in the middle of the day after being home for about a year. Not only were the transfers difficult but I was still wearing an external catheter so I had to beware that if I peed the prophylactic that I was using to fix the catheter to my penis my twist or I might fill up the bag itself either way it would end up bursting the prophylactic and drenching myself as well as if wherever I was  down covered in pee. That really only had to happen once  to train me out of that behavior. I watched more flat screen today a couple of movies and finished the limited series. That's a cheap way to spend the day but again my justification is while watching the flat screen I can lower my chair enough to take the weight off the rear end. It's a weak justification but it works for me. There's rain forecast again for tomorrow in the real low pressure system Moves In the temperatures will remain low. So I expect tomorrow's report will be similar to this days but that's okay I'm enjoying my time…..

Beat the odds

The cold weather is indeed moving in I can feel it now in my bedroom of my apartment. I haven't put extra blankets on the bed or anything like that I don't think I'll need to but I'm sure I'll have my head underneath the covers more than usual from here on out. I like to build a small cave for my head with just enough of a hole to ventilate and to see this light on my charger. It's not a big deal but it seems like gives me a lot of comfort during the night is too wake up and see the light on my charger whether it's orange or White, white if the charge is complete Orange or if it's getting close to the full charge the orange light will be blinking. The light assures me I'll have power for the coming day no matter what I choose to do. Over the weekend I washed my great white jacket/coat it's one of my favorite garments especially in the winter time it's very warm and it's very white I'm sure it'll look like a rolling snowball when I'm wearing the jacket. I'll wear it on the most fiercely cold days or during a snow attack. The jacket was quite soiled by the time I finally threw it in the washing machine well actually when I threw it in the washing machine I surprised myself only drying it for one dry cycle. I thought sure I should have used two but got away with just one that's a good deal. My next big washing challenge now will be washing the comforter on my bed. I have to make some repairs on the comforter before I was injected to the washing machine.

The rain fell today and like I observed earlier, it's getting cold outside. I plan to stay inside this season for more than I usually have done. I don't exactly know why maybe just to take it easy and not risk anything to the coldness slippery walkways of winter. I've just got to stop risking, Taking Chances and thinking I can The cold weather is indeed moving in I can feel it now in my bedroom of my apartment. I haven't put extra blankets on the bed or anything like that I don't think I'll need to but I'm sure I'll have my head underneath the covers more than usual from here on out. I like to build a small cave for my head with just enough of a hole to ventilate and to see this light on my charger. It's not a big deal but it seems like gives me a lot of comfort during the night is too wake up and see the light on my charger whether it's orange or White, white if the charge is complete Orange or if it's getting close to the full charge the orange light will be blinking. The light assures me I'll have power for the coming day no matter what I choose to do. Over the weekend I washed my great white jacket/coat it's one of my favorite garments especially in the winter time it's very warm and it's very white I'm sure it'll look like a rolling snowball when I'm wearing the jacket. I'll wear it on the most fiercely cold days or during a snow attack. The jacket was quite soiled by the time I finally threw it in the washing machine well actually when I threw it in the washing machine I surprised myself only drying it for one dry cycle. I thought sure I should have used two but got away with just one that's a good deal. My next big washing challenge now will be washing the comforter on my bed. I have to make some repairs on the comforter before I was injected to the washing machine.

The rain fell today and like I observed earlier, it's getting cold outside. I plan to stay inside this season for more than I usually have done. I don't exactly know why maybe just to take it easy and not risk anything to the coldness slippery walkways of winter. I've just got to stop risking, Taking Chances and thinking I can beat the odds…

 the odds…

Waiting for the rain

 As I've written earlier the local weather folks been calling this major storm to be hitting in Salt Lake this weekend. I have to admit I was a little intimidated by the whole thing especially going to breakfast on Sunday morning when they said that the storm might be at its worst. I sort of contacted my granddaughter who was the only other person in town right now that goes to breakfast with me and let her know that perhaps this wasn't a good time to go. I just left text message. She responded that if I wanted they would bring breakfast into the apartment since they planned to hang out here afterwards and help clean the place up a little bit. Well I decided Well I'll go anyway and of course this morning I went there was no rain when I went and it was raining when I left cuz it wasn't that big of a deal and I didn't have to go very far. Totally glad that I made the decision to go the kids join me at the restaurant we had a good visit and then back to the apartment where the kitchen was cleaned up floor swept and my quasi grandson started putting my cans in order all the cans of my pantry it's pretty chaotic and it took a couple hours but he had a great job you're still more that needs to be done at some point but we'll get to that later had a great morning with the kids though the apartment looks good and I feel excited to start another week. This supposed storm is supposed to last a good part of this week but that's okay I don't have anywhere to go no commitments out. I'll kick back and just enjoy each day maybe do a little cooking and try to do a little artwork.

Still dry at 9:00

I was really expected a lot more precipitation / rain then we received today. Of course now the weather people on the channels that I watch are saying the big weather maker will be tomorrow but I bet you it'll just fizzle out as well. I guess I'm glad I didn't rain on me too much I did have to get out and went to the market briefly but that was about it as far as the day's Adventures went. The clouds were in the sky no doubt they were dark and ominous and looked like they were going to open up any second so I didn't want to go out and get caught in that anywhere. I was able to enjoy however the warm part of the day. The cold front is supposed to move through tonight temperatures should drop tomorrow with a significant amount of rain predicted but we'll see what happens. I had a bit of a struggle getting up this morning not so much getting up as much as dressing myself. I woke up early again and to pass the time cuz I didn't want to get up till 6:00 a.m. roughly I finished the book I've been reading for the last couple weeks. By the time I finished the book it was almost 7:30 very late for me anytime to get up. Like I said it took me forever to dress myself this morning. My daughter called me this afternoon and in the discussion I was telling her about my morning ordeal and I relate on to her my difficulty in dressing. She did not say anything but I felt she was thinking well get someone to dress you on those other two days or 3 days of the week. I really suppose I could do that and I should do that rather than just sit around and moan about how difficult it is for me to dress myself. If I were to do this it would cost me roughly around 20 dollars a day. And I could do it I think pretty well but it's just the whole process I just don't want to give up my Independence even if it means taking hours to get dressed. I missed going over to the coffee shop this morning like I usually do on Saturday mornings just because I could not get ready in time. It was about 10:00 by the time I finally got dressed. I even had my shoes on which is getting easier and easier to do. I wonder what I missed today.

Before the storm

 

Even though I know it is not going back too much there's certainly the possibility if not probability that it could amount to much and then I'd be in big trouble- - Maybe. I'm talking about the giant storm supposed to be coming into this area tonight tomorrow and for all the next week supposedly. Rain is going to come and the temperature is going to fall and we're going to have storms. Like I said it's the biggest thing the local news folks has been talking about for the last week or so even the national news has had a couple stories about storms on the west coast and storms on the East Coast. They're even dragging El Nino into the whole thing. El Nino the Giant heating system of weather phenomenon or whatever it is which is supposed to arrive in the Wasatch Front tomorrow sometime. It's also Friday not that I'm Catholic, but if I can eat something this year fish like on Fridays I usually do. So this afternoon I got a hankering for New England's clam chowder. I had a can of this last week and I know I bought two but I couldn't find the one so I went on the bad Dash down the block and across the street over to the market. Of course had to go to the soup section of my market and of course Campbell's soup is a major section of that section. I always am a Marvel that the Campbell's Soup selections. I really only use a two or three of the kinds of soup you know being with bacon of course, chicken noodle and vegetable beef but today I was all in for clam chowder. I know clam chowder out of a cans not quite as nice as clam chowder matron scratch but I like to believe one of my favorite restaurants does Marketplace. Still having to get the clammy soup product without having to go out is still nice and lets me celebrate Friday like a fish day which I like to do if I get a chance. But all the different kinds of Campbell Soup amazes me but what amazes me even more what's that I think the soup is like two bucks and change! I know it's inflation but still that much money for soup but you still have to put water in and you cook? Even being with bacon but she used to be Dirt Cheap even in the old days was up there in that Arena of high prices. I only got one can of the soup and it was Progressive or Progresso I had the soup for dinner tonight. I probably should have waited till tomorrow when the storm is here to have the hot soup but I've got other favorites for the tomorrow and the rest of the weekend. I'm also debating whether to make sloppy joes or fry up some hamburgers. And I still have the hot dogs I haven't really gotten into yet, they all beef dog and I even got fresh hot dog buns and mixed with you for big bag of chips I should be ready for just about anything. I even weakened at one point in almost bought a roast that I thought about making tomorrow but really with all the food that I've got in the refrigerator now so I need to eat I just couldn't justify doing a roast though I'd like to. So, whatever the storms may bring I'm set even with cans of overpriced soup

Thousands

 I literally have thousands of blog postings! Well do the math I do a Blog everyday very rarely have I missed a day and each blog is about 500 Words usually 500 words or more. There's been a handful of days where I've done less but that's a rule I tried to keep my postings at 500 Words which I figure is roughly the amount of words on a page if you're doing a book. I haven't totally researched that out but it's kind of the way I feel. In the long time reader will remember that the whole concept of the blog for me was to see if I had the ability to keep writing something day after day until it's completion or whatever. At this point in my life I don't see completion being part of the formula so it's so whatever. I just keep writing and writing and writing pretending that I'm a writer I think I am so I'd like to be. Now if I can harness the same zeal for one particular subject or person are subject matter I could have had a book done by now and who knows maybe even published. I would be happy to have something published even if it's self-published. I believe I wrote about our friend Jerry Who's part of the writers group that I call writers Guild. He's the writer for the Deseret News newspaper. I kind of think he's retired I think he does guest columns every once in awhile that's what newspaper emeritus writers do, I guess. Jerry keeps doing these cool things that I never really thought of. When he wants to publish something she just does it. He doesn't try to woo some riding company or Publishing Company to do his stuff he just I guess contracts out with a printer or something and gets it written and published! At our writers Guild lunch last week he brought a document just a few pages long of his poems. I don't think it was more than 10 pages. Jerry  had poems and illustrations with the front back cover. You probably made 20 copies but it is enough to hand out to folks you'd like to share his Thoughts with. I would never have done anything like this I don't think not even if I had the funding too at least I never thought that I would however I'm beginning to reconsider this. Maybe throw some of my poetry together that I've rattle off over the years and sandwich it between two covers and have something to pass out the folks that I want to. That would certainly get something off my bucket list as far as being published in this lifetime. This certainly gives me something to think about now. Already I'm becoming intimidated that once I start something like this I won't be able to finish it just like so many other things in my life that I've wanted to do but never could figure out how to end the project. I probably shouldn't even have written a here in this blog cuz now it's out there. Luckily just very few people read this blog so there's not a big commitment to the world but to those who do read this blog they may really put some pressure on me consider and work on the project whether or not gets to the point of publication self or otherwise …

Working through Wednesday

I'm tired tonight, and that's a good thing, maybe I'll sleep well or at least better than usual. I was awake at 3:30 a.m. this morning. I woke again at 4:30 and finally at 6:00 I got up. My caregiver comes today she doesn't get here till 8:30 so I have to take care of myself until then. You know I do the things like make the coffee sometimes wash up some dishes from night before but not today. I worked on my word puzzle book for a while added some more flavored water to the refrigerator for me to consume during the day. That's my big thing now is that I have all these bottles of bottled water with flip tops making it easy for me to access and drink from the bottle. I take the bottled water or just Add Water when it's empty and add a container of flavor which I purchased at the dollar store which is now basically $1.25 store but still gets me lots of pouches of flavors. I can drink water a lot better when it's flavored then just drinking it for drinking sake actually for kidney and bladder sake or whatever it's supposed to do for me as a person with a disability who should be drinking tons of water.

Following my time with my caregiver you know the drill toileteen and then shower then dressing. My butt's been bleeding the last couple of days not a lot just specs here and there enough to worry me and somewhat uncomfortable. Why caregiver put a dressing on my butt today which counteracted the pain or discomfort and totally enjoyed cruising around in my chair without fear that I'm damaging my rear end even more. I'm getting more and more closer to that. Of time but I'm going to figure out how to get a hold of my wound people and have someone look at my butt and let me know what I need to do. I don't want to sound like a baby or being counted productive but I don't think I can stand having to do bed compliance. Bottom line I think I will probably have to do whatever I have to do and hope that I heal quickly enough that I can get back into the saddle or onto the cushion. I'm really going to suggest that I get a highly reliable cushion when they finally get around to getting my new chair. I've been paying for you all day no sweats or anything like that indicative of my body having pain. That's a good thing. We'll just have to see what tomorrow brings when I dress myself I think I'll be okay.

After getting some breakfast, or put in a breakfast together I got ready to go up to the Walmart on the corner. I got a deal in the email the other day indicating that Walmart Vision was having free adjustments to glasses. I couldn't pass this up because on my new pair of glasses I ran over them a couple days ago or I guess yesterday. I didn't break anything but I certainly been everything up to the point where I could barely get the glasses to stay on my head. The frame was pretty well messed up and as far as I can tell the lenses came through okay. They're really quite compromised in a lot of ways but they're wearable and I like the glasses actually. However, the lens and the frames were not broken just had to be forced back into some form of wearability. The technician girl tried to use that did I buy them here at this store- - I think I did actually but I couldn't really prove it but she just wanted confirmation that I had. She didn't fight it too awful much cuz my trump card would be to say well I got the message on the internet in my email. But she worked on my glasses for about 10 minutes and took it into the back to where either she or the the real optometrist pride and pressed and twisted the frames back into wearability. Of course they didn't charge me anything and of course had I had the patience, I would have let them work even longer on my frames. I have totally appreciated the configuration and involvement of the voice to text feature this software has built into it.

This is the one item I did today that made me feel that I'd accomplished something. It came back and did my own bike for an hour and listen to public radio for a while. I did okay for what I thought was a little amount of sleep and my butt doesn't hurt…

Sore butt

I can't believe I made it through this whole day. This morning I woke up around 4:00 a.m. really couldn't get back to sleep I was totally worried. I'm seeing a lot more blood or evidence of blood on my pads in bed. I really got some bleeding going on in the wound and I really had serious thoughts about canceling my meeting today with assist. But I thought I'd give it a shot anyway and see how I felt once I got up. Kind of focused on getting dressed as soon as I could just so I don't end up running late like I did last week. My butt was tender there's no question about that I'd rather it up with goop before I got up of course I don't know if that helps at all but it's certainly makes me believe it does. It was a bit of a challenge getting my shoes on in my shorts but I did. When I went to bed I thought I was going to poop the bed during the night but I didn't thank goodness. And by morning I was pretty well solid so I got dressed and even had breakfast spam and eggs and toast. I knew as tearing the butt up during the day I tried to be as gentle to the tissue as possible but I'm sure it's going to look Grim tonight and hopefully and I can get Melissa to look at it maybe we can bandage it up or maybe it's time I finally call the wound clinic make an appointment or do whatever I need to do to get some professional attention to the wound. I'm just afraid they're going to tell me bed rest forever. With other ones that I've had and do the best they can while I'm still up and about. I can certainly do more lay downs in my check if I have to. I don't want bleeding wounds to be the end of my days. But I did make it to the meeting and it was a relatively short one but we got the document signed and visited with the staff a little bit then round my way home. I was able to do my arm bike even though I thought that I would not be able to tolerate sitting that long but by then I think whatever I'm sitting on has gone dead and I was not receiving any pain at that point but I did the hour and then just so to hang around for the rest of the night finally eating the hamburger I made last week that I've had in the refrigerator. Like I said I made it through the the day which may not have been that wise but I certainly did my job.

I'm about ready to begin getting ready for bed I mean the whole process. I probably should even make coffee before tomorrow when Melissa will be back on a regular schedule. She loves the coffee I make. I'll just have to be gentle on getting in the pants off and not aggravated ruins I may have developed…

Jammies really?

I know it's probably not very healthy but, I like to keep cash in the apartment you know, operating funds, for those little things you don't want to have to use a credit card or check people still write checks? I know I do at least one a month. But nor to keep cash you have to get cash so usually after the first of the month but I've gotten my money in I like to go down to the credit union and pull out a hundred or so dollars in $20 bills or $10 bills or both just to have for emergencies. Like when I had to have my caregiver come over in the middle of the night to assist me- - for an hour or so - - I was just able to pay here 20 bucks in cash and she was okay I was okay the overhead company was okay since they didn't know but everybody was okay. It's a little awkward anyway when I run out of cash and then I'm just left with egg on my face with nothing to pay the piper. I also like to use cash when I run across the street too the market and pick up just one or two things. If I'm really Brave I leave the credit cards at home and just travel with the cash and have to get whatever I can just get with that and call it good.

I wish my credit union was closer to where I live. They used to be one like almost just across the street but that's long gone. Now I have to catch maybe two buses to get to my credit union. I know that sounds like a tremendous hassle but it's really not too bad especially if you're in the middle of the morning or the day. I have to take the bus from my apartment to the transit point which is the Community College and they're transferred to another bus which takes me over to the area by the credit union. I at one time actually rolled in my chair from my apartment over to the credit union and Back Again so I know I can do it it's just a terrifically physical event and I'm currently extremely worried about a possible wound on my rear end and I don't want to put my body through that kind of trauma. I think I'm doing enough damage just going by buses anyway, the buses run relatively quick so I'm not waiting forever. I finally get to the credit union and get in line. Where's the neat things about this Credit Union is it's pretty much all staffed by Spanish speaking folks and it meets a lot of Spanish speaking customers. It's pretty cool just sit there and be the minority. Anyway, I'm sitting in line with him forever. Luckily I was and a pretty short line which doesn't really matter if the lines not moving. Today the line is barely moving I don't know what was going on but it was a little exasperating. I'm sitting there, at the head of the line, waiting to be called and I noticed the guy at the service counter has a pretty wild shirt on but then I look closer and see this guy's actually standing in his pajamas. He's got this great shirt but then he's wearing the great shirt over pajama bottoms, Homer Simpson pajama bottoms. It's weird that I've noticed more and more people out in settings like this or the market or on the bus actually wearing pajama bottoms if not just complete pajamas usually under a jacket or something it's pretty strange. I wonder if they just wake up and say oh better get dressed put on the shirt over the job over the jammies and off they go- - to my credit union!

Change!

You know, 0ne of  the things seniors hate is changes to their routine. You can't do anything about them usually oh I guess you get all Rowdy and ugly and nasty about it but what good does it do things are going to happen and things have to be dealt with as they come but it's still really it's hard to accept sometimes. The caregiver usually gobs on Monday morning but she's got training tomorrow so she can't make it so we decide we'd go ahead and just do my regular Monday morning thing tonight which is cool but it's just awkward everything's different. I hate different. Things never seem to work out the way I want them to on these changes. If there's a bright spot to the changes it's that they're not forever. Once my person gets done with the train training things should be back to the normal schedule or that would be good all the way around. Just remember the big word is accepted and going through the difference or the change. I know this is a very abbreviated blog tonight but bear with me it's just a different evening…

 

Not a drop to drink

Another beautiful day with temperature soaring up into the mid 80s- - I can't believe I sound just like the weather person. It's true however two clouds in the sky big old sun shining like it's never going to quit. Great Salt Lake is drying up it's amazing and there's no rain in the forecast though I can hear via the local news reports. They report this with a big smile on their face like they're just reporting the news but they should know more than anyone else how dangerous it is for us all at least here at the Salt Lake area. This could be our Armageddon. I've often written and talked about Salt Lake Utah and surrounding areas I've been somewhat blessed and avoiding the natural catastrophes that seem to be enveloping the East and West coasts of the us as well as tornadoes stop in the middle of the country. Maybe, we are going to suffer with a severe drought with limited water options. I imagine we could truck water in if we really had to everything's in place to do that. It would be very awkward and difficult I imagine and probably very expensive but you got to have water it's as simple as that. Now I've got bottles of water stored in my cabinets here in the apartment complex. It's not a lot of water I know 10 or 12 bottles that I would fill with water after I drink the juice out of them things are two quart bottles. It'd be enough water to get me through a day or two hopefully I have enough bottles that I would be able to get by until more water gets here either my truck or whatever. Then I would fill up my bottles again. I got a little embarrassed there for a while filling up these bottles and really not having a place to put them except soaring this water back into the closet. For sure I look a hoot and I'm sure all the neighbors are talking about me but I've got the water and they don't have water they'll still keep talking about me I just think it's kind of interesting.

I'm also kind of wondering what's going to happen when, and we're pretty darn close right now as far as the water levels go, there is not enough water to spin the turbines to make the electricity. I'd like to think we have a backup plan for such an event but I don't know and I have not heard one either. It seems like at least once a week if not more on the 5:00 p.m. news there's talk about how grim the water situation is becoming about weird things popping up on the Great Salt Lake now the water is disappearing everything from Cars to weird Beach equipment. I'm just hoping we'll be able to muddle through this and maybe come out stronger than going in. Going to be like in the old days everyone's going to be packing a canteen just to get through the day

 

Lunch with the boss

 Another fairly busy day for me. I only had one appointment and that was a lunch with Claire my old boss from the state days. Up until that point in time I was just messing around the apartment kind of killing time but trying to be somewhat productive at the same time. Of course today's Friday that means I had Melissa over today but I didn't do a very productive session at all which kind of freaks me out the only upside is that because Melissa has class on Monday we're going to do my usual Day on Sunday so maybe Sunday night I can poop then I'll poop a lot better than I did today if I make it that long. I'm a little gun shy these days. I just hope that I don't have to go through another ordeal of waiting forever and pooped pants. Other than that the day is beautiful as far as temperature goes it did almost get 80 if not a little bit into the 80s today still it doesn't feel like July or August '80s September and October degree 80s it's just less potent. I'm sure if I was having to ride the bus home from school they would have felt very warm. I used to do that you know get out of my sixth period class as quickly as I could run down to the milk machine buy a cold chocolate milk to consume on the way home in the back of the bus. Those are great days. The milk machine cost a nickel that was amazing it is amazing.

As I alluded to earlier I had lunch with Claire my old boss at the little place across the street Hawaiian fast food joint called mookies. It's a real restaurant though you never know it looking at it just going past it but a place where we usually go I really appreciate it just because all I have to do is cross the street to get there. Claire was buying and told me to get whatever I wanted so I got the beef dish. I don't know why I didn't get the fish when it's Friday and everything I like to be compliant. But Claire was buying so I got the beef dish left half of it for dinner tonight and worked out just fine. But I think the meal was at least $40 counting the tip and that's for lunch! Used to be lunch was a cheap meal out you had with colleagues or friends. It wasn't as dressed up and fancy as a dinner but certainly costs like that now. And who knows what the dinner would cost. It's the inflation I guess and who knows what else if I listen clothes for the marketplace they certainly go over all the inflation talk and all that kind of stuff wish I had a better grip on it not that would make any difference at all but it would be nice to know what they really are talking about. They don't shy away from the hole artificial intelligence thing however and painting it with a dark brush which I totally understand. It's just I don't know how much longer we can keep going and how much it's going to impact me over the long period other short period. I don't know if I have that much time left anyway it's hard to say. I'm feeling great and Claire says I look great and I get that report from others too and I feel like someone great but I'm on my arm bike pumping away like I did this afternoon. So I have 180 minutes in now I just have 20 minutes more to get to my 200 minutes for the week. That's totally doable which I plan to do tomorrow. But I lost a day during the week when I had the pooperama I didn't ride the bike then I should have I have but I didn't...

The Writers Guild and El Nino

 The Writers Guild had lunch today as the dedicated reader knows we do that every couple months get together and visit. At one time the writers were going to bring together pieces of their material with the other folks and get some critique. That happened a couple times never with me however I just had never never written anything that was terrible I guess. For any significant period of time. Jerry of course right she's a writer by training and by profession. And Lori has taught writing and continues to write and they both managed to get themselves published off and on or they do self-publishing and that works too. Every once in a while I get a few urges to write like I used to but I can never carry through with the writing aspect. I just can't think of anything it's like a humongous writers block I've had for decades. I don't know if I'd even recognize the prompting still to write even if they came. I would like to think I could still produce something enjoyable I'm worth the effort to lock myself away and create. I wish I could justify going to the AI/si but that just doesn't seem right. I think I would just feel hollow regardless of what I wrote since I didn't do it myself. I know that sounds pretty selfish on my part but as much as I have badmouthed the AI universe I don't feel right going to the Fountain to see if I can drink some magic Elixir that will turn me into a writer. I'm still terrified of the whole AI thing and what it can do to humanity. I know that sounds a little over the top but it's true I can't help it if it's what TV shows and TV movies and real movies but made of over the years. It's life mimicking fiction and who knows what fiction will do to us. Still I totally enjoyed hanging out with the guys playing like I'm a writer like they are I'm just glad they'll have me at their table. After all they've done they've never told me not to come…

Oh, by the way, happy October! I guess I'm happy we're into another month but we're totally in a weird weather system right now. Supposedly we're involved in what they call a El Nino I don't think that's the right name but hopefully you'll know what I'm talking about. A weather phenomenon it's supposed to happen once every 100 or so years but now it's happening like every 3 years or something. Totally weird but the same time it's something that we've done to ourselves sort of like what I was just writing about on the AI Terrors that I was telling you about. If a doesn't get us in the super weather system that seems to be turned against the population of humans well and the other animals will take over the Earth again and perhaps that's best

Poop recovery

I  the whole day trying to ignore the fact that I lost a whole day yesterday because of pooping my pants- - again! Not trying to be a doomsist but I don't think these incidents are going to stop. I hate to say they're a function of age but I don't have anything else to blame it on. I guess I just have to build it into my financial situation that I'm going to have to pay someone to clean me up whenever this happens. Sometimes I'm going to have to wait 10 hours before something like this is available but just the same I guess it can be done even though it could be expensive, frustrating and somewhat defeating. I guess on the bright side is that I can continue going on without having to enter the halls of assisted living or worse. Even though I felt a little weak from the events I still had things I had to do and one of those was to trans port myself across the valley to the medical center for a medical appointment today at 3:00 or something like that. I use that as an excuse actually not to do my arm bike today which makes me feel somewhat guilty and I'm out 60 minutes. I just didn't feel up to doing the 60 minutes once I got back from the medical center and I felt a little frightened that I might aggravate my bowel. Who knows if that excuse well hold.

This really wasn't a real medical appointment it was just the first involvement of the medical profession to clear me to get a new power chair. That was somewhat exciting made me feel like things are actually being done to bring this about we'll see now. I just now have to work with a new resident guy named Van Hook who is seemingly pretty nice guy and he's willing to work within the system. I think he will assist me in trying to figure out what else I need to do as far as involvement with the physical therapist at the occupational therapist or who else is in charge of measuring me up and making sure I get that chair that I need. It was a good trip if not a very long trip it seemed I got to the doctor's office at the time they said and it still took me more than an hour to get seen. By the time I was finished I had stopped and they had taken some blood and I got my vaccines or my vaccinations for the year covet and the other one so that was productive and got done one shot I still have to pee in a bottle and bring that back so they can do some urine tests but everything else seemed to be somewhat positive. I'm kind of excited Melissa put new sheets on the bed this morning and we made the bed so it looks really nice I just hope I can keep it that way..

 I finished putting the stamps on this month's letters a few minutes ago and now I've just been hanging out and enjoying the feeling of accomplishment, getting out the kid letters one more month. It's not a big deal, not really. Getting the Letters Out for me does feel like a big accomplishment. Not only do I have to write the documents even if they are short I have to go through the whole process of downloading the letters from the tablet onto hard copy which means printing straight from my tablet to my printer. It's always kind of freaks me out I'm verbally think I'm not going to have enough ink but the last couple months I've been doing okay. I'm not showing any light spots in the printing aspect and the envelopes look good enough to mail. It's the process of signing the documents then folding then putting them in the envelope- - actually I think I've written this all down before probably last month or the month before so bear with me don't mean to be redundant. I just feel relieved when I get them out the door which will be tomorrow or day after- - most likely day after the last day of the month. Tomorrow I have to go into my assist meeting early and I could dump them off in the mail on the way but I just assumed wait till the last day of the month. I don't want him to get the letters too quickly.

Gray and overcast all day today I saw rain falling this afternoon. Fortunately I didn't have to go out at all today. I was supposed to go to lunch with my good friend but she had to cancel which is just fine with me. I stayed in and enjoyed my clean apartment. Sadly I don't report I'm beginning to drop stuff on the floor. Just by eating and regular activities of daily living in the kitchen has brought the beginning of Chaos. I will try to sweep up the mess I made today tomorrow and hopefully try to stay ahead of the breakdown of order. Hopefully and it sounds like that's what the kids have chosen to do is to stop by my place after breakfast and put the place an order and work on one particular project until I really am squared away. I still have bookcases to rearrange as well as storage areas to put in order all of which could take a couple hours so hopefully the kids will take care of me on a continual basis as long as I have my own chaos to manage.

Interesting in a terrifying sort of way I'm noted the major fears of artificial intelligence takeover is beginning to become a real item of concern to the General Public. Not that I've been preaching in the world but I've certainly made a couple suggestions regarding my thought processes and the way we're giving away our control to the ghost in the machine- whatever that might be. It's kind of spooky because it's like a movie or a novel where the AI actually slowly takes control of everything. There's been all kinds of news reports of the major AIS in the country or maybe even the world taking or trying to sneaking the computers and systems on major levels. So far, as far as We Know, they feel that the AIS are so young that they haven't really figured out how to really complete these takeovers and that we will be able to control the event I don't think that's going to happen really. We may have to throw ourselves back into the Stone Age In order to stay free I wonder if we could do that if we had to

Monthly mail out

 I finished putting the stamps on this month's letters a few minutes ago and now I've just been hanging out and enjoying the feeling of accomplishment, getting out the kid letters one more month. It's not a big deal, not really. Getting the Letters Out for me does feel like a big accomplishment. Not only do I have to write the documents even if they are short I have to go through the whole process of downloading the letters from the tablet onto hard copy which means printing straight from my tablet to my printer. It's always kind of freaks me out I'm verbally think I'm not going to have enough ink but the last couple months I've been doing okay. I'm not showing any light spots in the printing aspect and the envelopes look good enough to mail. It's the process of signing the documents then folding then putting them in the envelope- - actually I think I've written this all down before probably last month or the month before so bear with me don't mean to be redundant. I just feel relieved when I get them out the door which will be tomorrow or day after- - most likely day after the last day of the month. Tomorrow I have to go into my assist meeting early and I could dump them off in the mail on the way but I just assumed wait till the last day of the month. I don't want him to get the letters too quickly.

Gray and overcast all day today I saw rain falling this afternoon. Fortunately I didn't have to go out at all today. I was supposed to go to lunch with my good friend but she had to cancel which is just fine with me. I stayed in and enjoyed my clean apartment. Sadly I don't report I'm beginning to drop stuff on the floor. Just by eating and regular activities of daily living in the kitchen has brought the beginning of Chaos. I will try to sweep up the mess I made today tomorrow and hopefully try to stay ahead of the breakdown of order. Hopefully and it sounds like that's what the kids have chosen to do is to stop by my place after breakfast and put the place an order and work on one particular project until I really am squared away. I still have bookcases to rearrange as well as storage areas to put in order all of which could take a couple hours so hopefully the kids will take care of me on a continual basis as long as I have my own chaos to manage.

Interesting in a terrifying sort of way I'm noted the major fears of artificial intelligence takeover is beginning to become a real item of concern to the General Public. Not that I've been preaching in the world but I've certainly made a couple suggestions regarding my thought processes and the way we're giving away our control to the ghost in the machine- whatever that might be. It's kind of spooky because it's like a movie or a novel where the AI actually slowly takes control of everything. There's been all kinds of news reports of the major AIS in the country or maybe even the world taking or trying to sneaking the computers and systems on major levels. So far, as far as We Know, they feel that the AIS are so young that they haven't really figured out how to really complete these takeovers and that we will be able to control the event I don't think that's going to happen really. We may have to throw ourselves back into the Stone Age In order to stay free I wonder if we could do that if we had to...

Sunday supports

 Once again the kids came over to the apartment following breakfast. Their main goal was to once again clean my apartment and put various parts of it in order that seem to be in chaos right now. I totally enjoyed the opportunity to have them in the apartment and visiting with them doing this exercise. You've really been doing a great job and I'm trying to keep the apartment relatively in order from week to week I do pretty good until like Wednesday or Thursday then things begin to break down chaos begins to rise it's messy head. This week was very interesting because Jasmine had purchased some brushes that go on the end of the stick or handles and with that she can actually scrub the floor a lot of the little piles of things that have been dropped on the floor then walked on and dried and now they're just little hunks attached to the floor that you got to scrape them off well she did. Jackson helped and put a lot of muscle into scraping the floor as well as actually mopping the floor as well. They weren't satisfied to use those flaky mops you get at the market these days with the foam heads that you pull the handle down and squeezes the liquid out. They actually got the old time mops with the straggly hair looking pieces of cloth hanging out that you can really get moppy in the floor good and they did a great job. Perhaps the high point of the visit was the cooking of my frozen pizza that had in my freezer for a couple weeks now. I really am trying to do this process of using items that I purchase that typically I end up storing for way too long. So even though I had other food I could be eating we went ahead and cooked the frozen pizza which turned out to be quite good I was even able to get the kids to eat a couple pieces each and I still have pizza left over I guess I'm truly blessed. The one thing is really sort of interesting is that these kids are so fixated on the used by dates that if the cans got used by date more passed it they really want to just throw it out. I saved a can of Olives well I saved it by opening it up and now I'm eating them but it's like a couple years past the best use date and they're really to throw them out and I just can't get rid of a whole can of olives. True I've held on to and probably way too long I should have been eating all her sooner or later somewhere along the line but I have not so again part of my goal is to start eating my canned goods all of them fruits vegetables and whatever I think I would like to use some day I think the phrase to use is do it now!

1q

Friendship

I wasn't sure how I was going to handle my friend coming down from Idaho to spend time with me this afternoon. His wife had a baby shower further south than Utah County but she dropped him off here at the apartment complex and headed out for three or four hours. Like I said I wasn't sure what we were going to do in that amount of time. My friend has cerebral palsy and he uses a Amigo scooter, it's a nice scooter. H got here around 2:00 and the first thing that I did was drag him over to my apartment and show him around where I lived. We talked and talked from the very beginning going over a history of our lives together. At some point in time he had to get some food so we went over to a fast food joint across the street that I don't necessarily like but we went there anyway and got hamburgers. The hamburger I got was somewhat better or significantly better the last time I got there. We're still pretty expensive for a fast food joint hamburger even if it was called Arctic Circle. As a rule I don't like Arctic circles hamburgers at least this Arctic circles Burger but pleasantly my sandwich wasn't half bad. The extra onions and the extra pillow pickles may have had something to do with it. We munched through the lunch, a late lunch, then came back to the apartments and we just gabbed for the next couple hours until the wife called said she was on her way to pick him up. The time didn't Zoom by we talked a lot we renewed a lot of old experiences and talked about possibly doing new experiences. I think I've explained before that we initially met at Camp Easter seal, a group of rustic cabbage built on Lake Coeur d'Alene a truly beautiful setting. I don't know if we're going to get together soon again as winter is about ready to set in and he's quite a ways from the border at least from here in Salt Lake to Blackfoot Idaho. Maybe we'll be able to spend some more time together next spring and summer and we'll focus on such a local Gathering of ourselves. His wife attends a number of meetings down in Utah County throughout the year so maybe he'll get a chance again soon to settle up and come on down and we can figure out something else to do. We're just a couple of old geezers now just trying to make every moment count and not forget our shared pass..

 

Autumn Heat

Autumn heat is a different kind of heat then summer heat I've come to realize. It's okay it's just different like the last couple days have been beautiful and the temperatures have been in the low 80s. Before the equinox 80s degrees with sunshine is hot almost uncomfortably hot if one has to stay out in the sun for an extended period of time. But as you get close to the equinox and go post Equinox 80° is just comfortable. It's not too hot and when can easily stay out in the sun without much issue at least that's the way it is for me. I even had to wait for a bit of time for the bus this afternoon and it wasn't the unpleasant experience. I just been to the bank to get cash for letters and I had to wait for almost 30 minutes before the bus got to my stop. There's a bit of a breeze but quite pleasant, just the same it's like I said Autumn heat is a different kind of heat. Having written this I kind of remembered a little later on in the afternoon sitting out on the patio, in the sun, the temperature did get a little uncomfortable and I began looking for some shade. I even ate a double stick popsicle and I hardly eat any Popsicles after Autumn Equinox. It seemed the right thing to do. Not much else is happening spending a lot of time or sometime working on the kid letters getting them ready to go out by the first. I wish I had remembered when I was out by the market that I also going to need stamps this go around. Everything is getting so expensive I cannot believe it. I'm really beginning to understand all those pictures of the late 20s and early 30s during the Depression when people could afford bread or hardly anything. Sometimes it really feels like we're going back into that kind of a reality. I hope not but sometimes I think we're really getting set up. This evening it's even thinking about what I could do if I could get a part-time job somewhere just to fend off the rising costs of everything. Actually I feel I'm doing okay at the present time I just don't want to get worse.

Thursday's thoughts

I know it's only the second day into the new season but I must have been insist that I truly am enjoying this Autumn season so far. These days are beautiful cool in the morning but warming up in the '80s by the afternoon. Today was a great day I didn't have any commitments so I spent time reading on the patio after going out to the market and the dollar store to pick up a few items. I got those drink flavorings for bottled water which I really like and really I think it's helped me increase the amount a liquid I ingest during the day. I woke up pretty early stayed in bed till 6 I was able to get up and do a fairly decent transfer. I kind of focused on dressing because I wanted to be done by 9:30 so I could go to the coffee social. I was okay I was pretty well done by 9:15 and the social starts at 9:30. It was a good group today not a good discussion. I enjoyed the time I spent in the sun reclining on the patio reading off and on. Not much more is happening I did start the kid letters first of the month is coming up quickly. 

I don't know what happened but there was something going on with my power chair if it's the front wheels in the front are exactly what but all I know there is this real grinding feeling I was getting driving around the chair this morning and that sustained that way that feeling up until I went across the street on a fairly decent roll to the market and back after that chair is acting pretty much the same. I just don't want anything horrible to happen to the chair in the next couple days or weeks. I did make a appointment to meet with occupational therapist to begin the process of getting a new power chair. This is going to be a lengthy process I know but that's just the way it goes but at least I'll be doing the process. I didn't really even cook today. I used up the last or the rest of the tuna fish so I made the other day. I made a sandwich and had the rest of the soup that I had for lunch and had the same for dinner the other half of that lunch. I had that Mormon soup which is pretty good I was surprised. I have a lot of cans of it so I'm happy about that. It said from that I anticipate going to bed early tonight in hopes of getting even more accomplished tomorrow

 

Follow up appointment

I had one thing on my agenda today really, which was to go to a doctor's appointment at 2:30 in the afternoon over at IHC Hospital complex. I still don't know why I made the appointment as late as I did basically ate up my whole day. After I finished my Wednesday routine with Melissa I pretty much hung around the apartment. I got myself a breakfast toast and Cheerios pretty much it was a pretty good breakfast and not fried or really salty or anything. I was kind of shocked when I suddenly realized I was only an hour and a few minutes away from when my appointment was supposed to be and I had to get all the way into the community college and then still take the bus over to the hospital area. Luckily I was able to pull all the rabbits out of the hats was able to get to the hospital a good half an hour before my appointment. The office is on the 8th floor of the big buildings over at the hospital area. I used to like to go up there and look out over the western side of the city often to the Horizon towards Wendover. But however the windows seem dirty today on the outside for sure. I guess they're not really spending the money to employ folks to go over the edge and keep those windows clean looks pretty bad however it's almost depressing. My appointment was for 2:30 I was supposed to be there by 2:15 and I was there by seems like 1:45 it could have been 1:30 for all I know. They checked me in and I just sort of hung out in the foyer looking out the window and playing with my cell phone until they finally came and got me for my appointment. I was seen my first, by the nurse who text my blood pressure and stuff and just be prepped for the docs that'll be in 15 to half an hour later. My nurse acted kind of spooky she indicated I had super high blood pressure. I did have spam for breakfast and toast with butter so I could have increased my salt and giving off strange reading. Later on the MD negated that information and he did indicate he too light spam a real guilty treat. It was relieved to find that this was just a follow-up appointment that I made last year. I had a good discussion with the nurse and then later on with the doc who really treated me well and seemed to enjoy the information I was able to give him regarding my lifestyle, history historical as a child and then later on is an adult Independent Living movement most specifically the ilc work. The doc was truly impressed. Then he sort of backed away bowed out and another doctor type of person showed up we had a great discussion even told him about my blood in my stools he said it was all sounding pretty normal to him. Turned out to be a pretty good guy I mean I've gone to him for a number of Seasons now can't seem to remember him he's kind of nondescript maybe I'll remember him now however you seem to make a connection. I even told him about the bloody stools hey basically just shut it off which is cool with me. We had a really long discussion a lot of my historical stuff came out he seemed relatively impressed and we resolved to me to get in one year the same day pretty much a year from now about the same time

 

Great Expectations

Today was a gift. There was no meeting in Salt Lake so I didn't have to go into town today so I actually spent time building a breakfast which I really haven't done in the last couple of months just seemed that I've been so busy I haven't really done a lot of breakfast cooking a little bit of the other cooking during the day like this roast and stuff like that but just fun cooking which I did today. Nothing elaborate just good old spam and eggs and we toast. I did enjoy the event. Also, the day was somewhat overcast and rainy to at different points. The temperature was warm enough to enjoy being outside and I did go out outside for a bit. I actually found something I've been felt that I've been needing for some time but keep forgetting. I bought two packages of dental floss something like 255 yards- - that's a lot of floss. They're at the dollar store across the street from my apartment which was like I said not a major trip but it was a nice trip and got me to the market and made me feel like I accomplished something for the day's time. I did my usual too and consumed a couple movies during the poor weather time of the day. But if anything was to make this day more special than the others was a phone call I just got from my buddy Henry, a person from my past. I'd like to say he's a college buddy and he is actually but before that he was a camp buddy.

I met Henry at this place called Camp Easter seal. I think I've written about this before somewhere in this blog I mean I have more than 5,000 postings so I think that somewhere I've covered Camp Easter seal before but it's a camp for folks for kids with disabilities and I think I got shipped there in my second year of disability when I was like 16 or something. I'm sure it was meant to give my parents are the families some space from having their disabled kid around all the time. Anyway, not that we were more disabled than the other kids at the camp but we are kids who had to rely on Mobility devices Scooters or wheelchairs and we were in the special cabin we called it the K cabin just because all the cabins had a letter on them. Anyway, Henry was in our cabin he sort of got stuck there because he fell down and hit his head on a table and had to be at our cabin for the rest of the event it was about 2 weeks if I remember right. We did a lot of stuff some of it within the rules some of it not but we certainly made some bonds. Then like I said later on we met up at the University we are in the same dorm actually. We weren't so social at that point we should have ran in different groups or I didn't run any group Henry was a politician so he had his own group and it was quite active with the religious social group on campus. But now that we're on the other side of Youth way into seniorhood it's great to visit. He's actually coming down from Idaho for a couple hours while his wife is going to baby shower  40 minutes south of town. We should have a couple good hours to hang out. He has a scooter and I think we'll start the coffee shop that I go to every Saturday morning and Branch out from there. It's not like we're going on any long expeditions but still it should be fun…

 

The Equinox is coming

Autumn officially begins sometime tomorrow, the weather guy seem to indicate it would be here sometime in the afternoon. It's not like I can tell are there some giant whistle or Bell or gong that sounds rather just one seasoned silently slipping away to a new season. It's Equinox typical person stay at night, light and dark. The word itself Equinox used to fascinate me. This kind of spooky sound but stood for something really phenomenal I thought I thought it was really cool about the Earth spinning out there in space changing its position so everything was just equal. I suppose this phenomenon last couple days and then begins to tip away from the good old son as we begin our winter phase. It just seems so cool learned about the whole Equinox thing. I actually tried celebrating it for a couple years when I was living in an apartment someplace else and not married just never really caught on. I don't think other people are as fascinated with the whole concept as I am. I mean seriously it doesn't take a whole lot to impress me. I think I'm easily intimidated a lot of people tend to think I'm brave beyond words sometimes but I've got them all fooled I think I'm afraid of a lot of things in fact I can confess that I'm still basically afraid of the dark. I've learned to live with Darkness and to accept Darkness but still I'm afraid I'm going to see things in the dark that I don't want to see. I often get this feeling on I've got all the lights to the apartment turned off except in the bedroom I'm getting ready for bed. I think a really scary thing would be to have somebody walk out of the darkness no the other room into my bedroom just like that. That has never happened the person walking out of the darkness and I doubt that it ever will but I wouldn't surprise me if it did. I imagine dying in my room some evening and someone stepping out of the dark room handout stretched taking my spirit hand and then just leaving through the dark and door to whatever the next stop along the line is. I used to have the same feeling when I used to hook up the hose to the basement faucet doing the winter, also the dark time, and there's a light bulb he had to twist to turn on and I always knew that sometime I was going to turn the light bulb and I would see somebody standing over there by the potato bin just staring at me. I hated that experience but I would have to do it until spring when we hooked the water faucet back up on the other side of the front yard fence to water the beasts with. Or once I was terrified of such an experience now I don't necessarily want to see it but I won't be terrified if I do do meet someone walking out of the darkened front of the apartment…

QA 

Savoring Sunday

My rear end is hurting this morning as I got up but after I got dressed and such the pain subsided it wasn't really a super super pain just an irritation pain again my big fear is possible but I really don't think there was anything like that going on. I try to keep a close eye on going on behind my back but it's just hard. I have my caregiver keep an eye on it too but sometimes I think she doesn't tell me exactly what I want to know because she's afraid that I'll respond by being totally freaked out - that's what I would be but I need to know this kind of things as opposed to sitting in denial. I do try to mitigate the problem of sitting up too much by laying down in my chair as much as I can during the day when I'm not out goofing around. This morning I had to get up get dressed and have breakfast with the kids at the local restaurant. It was a bit of a reunion cuz Mark finally got back from Russia, turkey and other surrounding countries. It was a bit fascinating to listen to his adventures. Following breakfast Mark went on his way hopefully to recuperate as far as dealing with the jet lag and all that he came in last night actually. Jazz and Jackson came over to the apartment and cleaned up quite a bit not there was a whole lot to do except that last night I cooked the roast that's always an explosion in the kitchen when I cook so I did appreciate them taking on the stove top in the sink or I did a lot of the meal prep for the roast and vegetables. I actually had the roast beef sandwich for dinner it was great. I kind of find it hard to cook for myself but when I do I certainly appreciate the effort and the taste.

My task for the week is to contact my wheelchair vendor and start the process of getting the new power chair. For the first time I think I've got most of the people online and willing to do what it's going to take to get the power chair. Of course I'm always somewhat reticent because I know the things are going to go wrong and it's never going to be exactly what I want or ordered but I usually work around the problems and survive fairly well. Chances are this will be the last power chair I ever order I hope it'll meet my needs the way that I wish and hope that does. It's not rocket science I don't know why the sales guys always have such a problem with what I ask. Essentially what I want is a chair that does exactly what the chair of sitting in right now does essentially an elevator function on the seat and the ability to lay my chair down to a laying position. I would appreciate any increase in speed they could lay on me but I doubt that's going to happen I think there's a law or something that says they can't sell power chairs that go a certain speed or a bump a certain speed that might be from the insurance provider who's purchasing the chair's point of view cuz they're going to go the cheapest route they can if they can get the smaller Motors that's what they're going to stick with but I've gotten used to sanction speed and realize that it's for my own benefit. Bottom officially begins tomorrow or day after I can't recall but it's super close now. Good morning feel cool it's not cold and I'm having a bit of a problem staying warm during the night I might even try to put another blankets  on my bed tonight to see if that makes a difference...

 

Cell phone Saturday

I really did not intend to be away from my apartment as long as I work today. My goal was to jump the bus run down to zag and then get back to the apartment and take it easy for the day in an effort to stay off or I keep the pressure limited off my rear end. I'm not sure if I've got some skin breakdown back there but I don't want to encourage any more if I do however things were not to be that way. Remember I had to go to zag to finish getting my phone taken care of. Haven't been able to use it this week because the battery died and of course they didn't have the battery I needed in stock so they had to send away and they did and told me to return in a week which I did which was today or yesterday and they couldn't do it yesterday cuz things are all messed up I can't remember why but they said if I left it they'd have it done today when I showed up around 11:00. Of course that was not to be the person who actually fixed the cell phone put the battery in cleaned it up may look really nice left the protective shell back at another building and they would not be able to get it to me for a great while I told him that wasn't good. I just wanted my phone so they readjusted some of their stuff and had some buddy else run down to pick up the casing. So I went back to Best Buy to wander around and kill time which I did. Eventually, I rolled back to the zag office / store and the young woman who was working with me came out with the phone in hand it was done! I can't believe how much I missed my phone and how glad I am to have it back. I know it's pretty sad but now I feel whole again. Look at messages and voicemails and stuff like that that I haven't been able to look at for a week more than a week actually. I can finish updating my calendars as well as work with my bank. So much stuff has to run through my phone I guess that's the way it is with everyone. I finally did get home checked on the roast that I put on slow cook or a little cook before I left thanks for coming fine. It's been enough time on low I ended up turning the heat up for an hour the next couple hours to cook the vegetables and finish cooking the roast. Supposed to finish by 6:00 and I pulled off a couple hunks of meat as well as some potatoes and carrots. I can't say it was a real dinner like a sit down dinner it was way more barbaric/basic than that it was damn good and I really think the roast that I got was worth the 1850 I paid for it. I threw it in the refrigerator and then washed out the crock pot and moved it back into his little corner. I do like Crock-Pot cookies

More than clip clip snip snip

 I slept pretty good after Melissa got me to bed and left the apartment. There were a number of things that Melissa didn't know how to do as far as placing the wheel the power chair and making sure it was set up for the transfer plus the fact that the cover of the cushion had been taken off and cleaned of all the debris on the cover. So I was transferring right onto the internal parts of the cushion surprisingly it went okay the transfer as well as going around making coffee and getting ready for the day. The whole event was blessed I think. I did have some stinking thinking towards the end of the Sleep process before I'd gotten up. I just kept thinking I was all done living independently and I couldn't do it anymore and I was just too confounded in two dangerous just too messy but once I was up all of those thoughts began to dry up and vanish. If I look at them too closely I could see them coming back but I try not to dwell on the failure of living independently if I can. Clearly through the day I got clear ramifications that I'm doing okay I'm living all right and I'm still doing okay dressing myself and getting by. I just guess I need to realize that I'm going to probably mess up more than I used to. This kind of worries me but I try not to dwell on the small setbacks. I however realize that everyday I get a little bit older and sooner or later I'm going to lose the ability to care for myself as I am doing now and as I have done.

I really only had one project to consider today and that was taking the bus down south to the podiatrist I have my toenails clipped. This is a project that I'm beginning to consider me be a little Overkill. And this morning I was seriously thinking on letting my friend Richard the podiatrist know that I was not going to be coming back. This is what I thought going into the session today. I slowly convinced that my caregiver / Melissa, can't very well take care of my feet or at least clip my toenails. Truth is I'm not sure how much I want to continue taking the bus all the way down to the end of the 217 or it turns into the 218 and still go to the two blocks or four blocks to my podiatrist in the scourges of winter. The next appointment is in November. I held back on letting the podiatrist know I was going to see him because I watched what he did with my feet as I sat there I wouldn't have thought he did a lot more than just trim my nails- - what you did very well. But he looked closely at my feet and you look closely at any issues and problems I was having and then I realized that I needed to keep going to this guy because he really does care about my feet and he has a very good eye on issues and problems that come up with senior feet. I don't know if I want to let my caregiver do a little bit of my nails or maybe none at all I'll have to visit with her on that see how she feels. I know that Richard, my podiatrist, charges back the insurance folks quite a bit for maybe 20 minutes of work. But he's a trained eye and I appreciate that and it certainly well worth it. Will address this again in November..

$20 poop!

 I hate not being able to transfer myself on and off the toilet- - like I used to. Can't believe how independent that I was. Of course I'm moaning about this because I'm sitting I think on a pile of poop, not sure yet but it kind of feels that way and I have been cramping this afternoon. It's getting later in the evening and it's so difficult trying to contact anybody without a cell phone I'm just going to hack it out until tomorrow morning when Melissa will come. I'll be okay just wrap myself up in pads. Once I'm laying down I think I'll be fairly safe. Like I said I'm not sure how bad I am because I don't smell anything to speak of or to smell of but it feels like I'm doing something off and on I guess I'll find out when I strip down for bed. All that being said

I've had a fairly busy day. Half of my safety belt system came undone this morning so that necessitated a trip up Redwood Road to ucat where I was able to get a hold of Robert and refasting strap back onto the seat so I guess I'm safe again. I really don't believe in those restraints are these restraints but I feel better psychologically when I have it in place it also allows me to carry things in the belt itself what should I do appreciate. Like my cell phone and my wallet sometimes and other things I can just sort of put between the band and the belly and they seem to stay there pretty well. Of course it's Thursday that means it's coffee social which the day lasted quite a while because I got visiting with the new person at our facility when we talked for at least an hour after the group ended maybe even longer. We have some strong variables in common and that was nice to talk to her about those kind of things like good old Iona Idaho. When I got back to the apartments I spent some time in the Sun but a lot of time watching a couple old Marvel movies waiting for the news to start. I spent a lot of time trying to keep the poop that they but that's a losing battle. And I'm not sick or anything it's just too much poop in the old body and it's got to come out time and if I was able-bodied it'd be just a matter of going in and sitting down and pooping and then going on for my life. This is what most people do. But every once in awhile my timing gets off and I can't hold it Whatever It Is until my caregiver gets here. Fortunately I just found out she's in the area tonight and I'll stop by and give me and assist. Of course I'm then have to pay for the service which I will use is 20 bucks and that just irks me because of what I mentioned earlier if I had the body I could just do it myself which I did forever. But now I have to pay for everything sort of like what's a poop worth 20 bucks to me that's amazing

Just another wash day

Remember I was talking about the apartment inspections? I was shocked this morning when the department manager literally ran me down to tell me that she was totally impressed with my apartment. She thought it was the best looking apartment in the building. This of course is Jasmine's fault, my granddaughter who's taking such good care of me these days. Jennifer, the building manager didn't care she just was impressed with what my apartment looked like. I felt like a kid again being told how impressed he looked at her how strong he looked or something. I am so easy it's pitiful. In fact I had been a little concerned about had they even inspected my unit yet. I was under the impression they had just because one of the doors I never lock was locked in the light above the patio was turned on, in the middle of the day.

It's it's Wednesday wash day and that means hanging around the apartment until the dryer is finished. This always seems like a major long period. I was able to spend some time out in the early sunshine as it worked its way through clouds but it wasn't too chilly or cold. I was a little a nerved when I pulled the clean clothes from the dryer and they are still a little bit damp, not a whole lot but just a little bit like there was too many clothes to dry for the period that I was operating the dryer. Rather than feeding the dryer anymore money I decided I'll just take the wash as is and close the dry eventually by the time I got to him during the week. I did not sleep as well as I was like yet I don't know why I'm exhausted this evening. Granted washing clothes is a bit of work but not that much. I was going to go on an adventure head south down to Harbor Freight to get some duct tape but then I figured why go through the trauma of getting on the bus riding it miles south and then returning I ended up going to the Dollar Store across the street and found a couple of small rolls for $1.50 a shot and should be okay. My caregiver Melissa and I are both shocked to me couldn't find any duct tape around the apartment. I was going to take the cushion and tape it better to the power chair. I sit on the cushion and it gets a little squirrely sometimes and in the past we've fixed it to the seat quite literally with duct tape and it seems to work well enough. It's a bit unsightly but I'm Way Beyond appearances at this point in time. I did return to the apartment however and spent an hour on the arm bike but even with all this I can't believe I'm exhausted to the point that I am right now looking forward to some bedtime. I hope I'll have better luck sleeping this evening…

 

Changes

It was good to get back out on the road today now that my power chair is repaired. I don't have to worry about it, the power chair, stopping randomly along my path or travel this was so annoying and so unnerving. Now that seems to be a thing of the past common now I just have to work on getting a brand new chair which seems like it's a possibility now. I have to connect with my physician now, again, to write a letter of need for such a vehicle. I don't know why I seem to be dragging my feet on this task maybe for fear that they'll turn me down even though they've said they will not they just I'm frightened that they might. That's okay anyway because I'm sure I'm going to get my heart broken one way or the other when I order this new chair and it comes. Just never seem to be happy with things like that I just don't do very well with ordering items. But tomorrow, hopefully, I'll be able to make the call over to my doctor's office and see about them writing a letter of support. Even then I don't know how long it'll take to get the chair built and usable. I kind of look forward to it but I just don't build my hopes up too much.

Today was kind of busy for me I had two major events. One was the regular assist, ink meeting downtown Salt Lake across from the library at 11:00 a.m. and then following that a fast jaunt across downtown over to the train then back down to South Salt Lake to meet with my friend Lori for lunch, a late lunch at the Restaurant not far from my home. I was so pleased I was able to make it there on time. The only drawback was that one of the individuals that meet with our lunches our lunch group, Jerry our writer friend had other options he had to deal with today mainly a funeral and that's a shame. It seems at this point funerals are becoming somewhat common as folks within our strata begin to die out and I guess that includes us to a certain degree but not yet anyway. I worry about Jerry sometimes I don't think he's too well but I sure like it when he meets with us and treats us like equals an adults. Lori and I had a great conversation I think we generally do. We're fortunate enough to have great conversations of entertainment, substance and Hope. I think I feel fortunate in that conversation with Lori comes easily. We easily fill up an hour or so depending on topics of conversation. I think we visited for about 2 hours with today's lunch, a perfect way to spend an afternoon in the fall.

I wore a long sleeves today. The first half of the day was somewhat chilly I'm glad that I chose the long sleeves but towards the afternoon today did really heat up. Even though I was uncomfortably warm at times I was glad that I had the long sleeves on. More and more each morning I feel the coming of the next season. I paid special attention to the leaves on the trees in Salt Lake today as I went downtown. They're all quite green and still quite healthy- - the cold has yet to cut their supply I guess from the mother tree. If I travel I guess I could go to the mountains and see the early colors of the trees change has fall gets closer day by day. If one looks very close and listens very carefully one can just barely see and hear the beginning of the change..

Movie Monday

 I continue on my phase of waking early and not being able to get back to   but somehow getting through the day. I've been getting to realize a pattern I don't know if it's accurate or true but but seems to me is that if I go to bed I mean to sleep or try to go to sleep before 12:00 midnight and if waking up like at 3:00 a.m. and find it very difficult to get back to sleep. That's what happened last night I crashed around 11:30 because I wanted to make sure I was up in time to get dressed and be ready to meet my granddaughter for breakfast at my local restaurant. Ended up waking at 3:00 a.m. having to pee it took me almost an hour to get that job done I'm just not as functional as I used to be but anyway after draining about 400 cc's which is a lot for me lately, especially in bed. I was pretty much awake and though I tried to get back to some sort of sleeping scenario which I may have done shortly for a few minutes here there I was pretty much up. Maybe it's just a senior thing other seniors I know I hear a number of other seniors around here talking about walking the floors here at night because they can't sleep so they just tend to walk around the building. That really sounds kind of creepy actually but since I totally don't have that option I just think about all these new ghosts walking around. Then all the guys take a nap around 10:00 a.m. I suppose that's what we do now it's so weird.

I was finally dressed and ready to go by 7:00 a.m. and I wasn't to meet my granddaughter till about 8:00 a.m. so I just hung around the apartment resting trying to visualize and wonder what she's going to do because you promise you would come over to the apartment after breakfast and work cleaning the place up a little bit. Our building apartment inspections this week and I'm not really ever sure what they're looking for but my granddaughter does such a great job I love to see what she can do to miss like mine. And today she did a great job probably spent 2 hours and just made the place look great I thought/ think. We talked a lot. I hope I didn't show that I was struggling to keep myself focused because I was so sleep deprived that I may have kept spacing off the conversation but she didn't say anything if she was aware that I was kind of sloppy awake. It's a beautiful day or it was a beautiful day with a lot of wind because of a front coming in. I really didn't do anything after we finished the house cleaning. I was just too tired. I just sort of turn on a movie and have hardly watched and dozed through the afternoon. Of course it's the football season now which means none of my regular programming is available ie 430 news and the local news. They just go from one football game to the next or tennis are now soccer the real pain in the ass. I wish they would need to networks alone and continue to do it if that's going to happen but I can wish…