Alzheimer's the Specter of

I have been trying to remember the name of a movie all day and it's eluded me every single step I took to find it. I can remember bits and pieces of the movie but not enough to really bring out who acted in the movie or other items I could use to try to identify the movie. It's that feeling, you know, but it's just barely out of your reach you can see it sometimes you can feel it but you just can't say it you can't focus on it entirely. Just sitting there out of the corner of your memory mocking you sometimes. And like I've been writing about the last couple of weeks I'm wondering if my memory is getting worse if it's the Aging processor worse some sort of neurological issue. I don't know for sure at least I know how to get around the roadblock it may take a while in this case it's taking like a half a day or almost a whole day till I finally remembered one of the actors in the movie and that's Bruce Willis. When I brought up the filmography for Mr Willis of course the movie comes up and I can see it and now I remember it it's unnerving however but as long as I can figure out a way around then I'm okay and I'll be able to just continue on remembering 98% of all the stuff I need to remember when I need to remember it. I just pulled that number out of the air I don't know how close that is to reality but I think it is close. I can pretty much remember all that I need to but I am writing things down a lot more, I particularly tried to write things down on a calendar of some sort whether it's on the Internet or my tablet or my cell phone.

About the only thing I did of any consequence today probably even more important than the 20 minutes I did on my arm bike to get my 200 minutes for the week was to head over to the market to do some brief shopping. More importantly to me was to put some mileage on the batteries and see how well they're holding up. I could have gone further I should have gone up to the Walmart in that area 5400 South and seeing how well the battery holds up but it being 100° day didn't want to push anything to speak of pun not intended. So it's a trip over to the market and Back Again but you put me over the mile mark on my odometer at 93% battery. I think if I went 2 miles I'd be okay 3 Mi then I think it's getting a little iffy. So right now it's boring as I seem to be I'm just sort of just hanging out here at the apartments taking care of my power chair taking care of myself by laying back down in my chair so it takes the weight off my butt…

Just a little assist

I don't know why but I feel my 1 hour arm bike pumps are a great accomplishment in my days. I did a 1 hour pump this afternoon of course and that's because I was exhausted on Tuesday and I didn't do my regular hour then. That was the day that I'd gone to my meeting downtown Salt Lake and the heat it pretty much makes me on the way home. Typically, Thursdays I only have to pump 20 minutes to get my 200 minutes in for the week. But not today tomorrow I will do the 20 minutes to round out my week but still leaves me Saturday and Sunday to rest up before I start all over again next week. I feel fortunate that I could do this. I spent a little time earlier this evening cruising some disability reddit's and I was kind of fascinated about how many folks were talking about and being disabled and trying to be as independent or thinking that they are independent as they were. There was some guys that have been disabled for some time- I didn't run into any that had been gimped out as long as I have but I wasn't looking very closely either. I didn't say all I need to compare. But it was interesting a lot of the new Crips were talking about how they were going to last a long time and probably more honestly at what time in the lifespan do folks with disabilities lose their independence or ability to be totally independent. Not really is interesting I try not to think about it too much but I certainly see it happening to me. Quite frankly I'm totally shocked that I'm still living by myself in an apartment was just the assistance of a person 3 days a week. I remember for the longest time being just totally independent. I could live in a manual chair crawl into the chair if I fell out and go on with my life. Eventually I had to go to a power chair that was quite a big change but the same time I really kind of enjoyed it. Now however there's no way I could ever get myself back into my chair if I fill out or back onto my bed had I fallen out. I could do this at one time I didn't think too much of it now it's major. I was shocked at how quick I went from me and married to single and I couldn't take care of myself by myself anymore. I totally understand but I think it should have freaked anybody out. I'm still impressed with myself how well and that I went through that. And how fortunate I was to blend in the place where I'm living at now. As I said 3 days a week someone comes in gets me on to my shower bench or chair halfway showers me I shower the rest of the way as well as on to the toilet where I do my business and then she dresses me and goes on her way. And I'm on my own till I see her the next time which is basically a day away unless it's Friday then I have to cruise until Monday which is really a long time. I suppose if I really needed to I could pay for another day of assistance but I haven't had to do that yet. I am just amazed again how independent I could be with just a little bit of assistance.

 

Desperately Seeking celery

!I was getting a little too self-secured. Has been to think things are going my way and I was doing okay- that which I am. Don't get me wrong. Just that I should have realized that she was going to drop soon and that I should be in more control of what's going on. Yesterday, was busy cuz I went into town and went to my meetings and stuff but when I got back sometime during the afternoon the yellow light came on in my control box meaning that losing power I hadn't really gone that far. But odometer just read 3 miles and I often do three miles easily and I don't get into the yellow zone. Reality is that they said that one of my batteries was bad and we had better get do batteries soon and that's what started the whole process of me contacting my battery shop or my wheelchair shop and starting the process. But now because I got some what lazy and somewhat unrealistic and thinking everything is okay I was once again thrown back to the reality that I'm only as good as my equipment is good. Hope that came out right. If my hard share fails I essentially fail. It's bad enough that I'll be in my backup chair whose batteries themselves or somewhat Limited but I only have to be in that chair for maybe a day and a half at the maximum 2 days. I can live with that but having to live till the 31st of August from now till then is a long time and even though I charge my chair up every night reality says I can only go so far during the the following day. That's the real head scratcher is that I'm not sure how far I can go. I'm not sure how much this hot weather is affecting everything. I know temperature extremes play Havoc with power chairs and particularly the batteries. So, I'm just having to really meter out how much time or power I'm using everyday until I can get the new batteries in my chair. It's kind of nerve-racking. I guess the best part is that this is happening during the summer I think it would be much more dangerous if I were going through the same situation in the dead of winter and I can be stranded somewhere without adequate protection from the cold.

With all this in mind rather than driving my chair across the street to go shopping I decided to use one of those shopping apps. I've used them off and on for the last couple of years. I like to tell myself that I don't really use this app very much because I like doing my own shopping however the truth now is that I need to be careful on how much I spend money wise and I can get straight away purchasing more food than I can use. Doing this kind of shopping is very frightening to me for some reason. It's like I feel I'm spending money I don't have and actually I know that's not the case. I can spend lots of money still and basically be all right. I just hate to see my resources dwindle. But today I shopped for a number of items that will keep me going for some time shredded cheese, Ritz crackers, even celery fresh celery. Remember the rice I told you I was making the other day well I still have it and I haven't done anything with it but today I got some celery chop some of that up with onions and maybe throw in either some chicken frozen chicken legs I could fry up or bake been at the brown rice too the whole concoction and make a pretty good …. dinner for the rest of the week. And now I have celery

Rice is nice

 I didn't do my arm back today and there really is no excuse for it. Actually I think the excuse that I did use to myself was that I was just too tired, exhausted the heat baked out my will to turn the arm crank. That's okay I still have a number of days in a week that I can get my our in so that by Saturday I'll have the 200 minutes in easy peasy. That's correct the heat is back or should I say the heat is on, what a great song It's a pretty good movie too. Anyway, it was a Tuesday or is it Tuesday so I jumped the bus and went all the way into the city for my assist meeting. It went off all right had a lot more names than usual which is good made me feel like I at least made the trip for some reason. I was going to jump the train and come back home immediately but I was a little late trying to get out to the train and it passed before I could get there and I sure didn't want to spend any more time downtown Salt Lake than I had to so I went to a burger joint downtown and this time rather than getting something with me in it I controlled myself it just got half fries half onion rings in the order. It was less than five bucks which is great. I also found the combination quite tasty. I don't know how often I would do that to myself but I did enjoy the meal. I got off the train at the community college enrolled over to the market pick up a couple items that I have not had that I needed probably the most important being a loaf of bread. Not necessarily for sandwiches but for toast especially in the morning. I also got hot dog buns. This of course means that I'm going to have hot dogs sooner than later now and I do have some nice dogs in the meat container in the fridge. That's a lot of food to put in yourself at one time. I suppose it can't be any worse than the sloppy joes I've had last week. I need to make up another food backup product. I'm thinking I have another can of not ground beef in those poor people cans of food that I get from the food bank. Last night before going to bed I actually made a pot of rice brown rice. So my thought being perhaps I can take the can of beef again put it on the stove with onions green pepper garlic and then mix the contents simmer for a while then add it to the rice. I think this would make a comfortable gruel and maybe quite enjoyable to eat. I got actually do some research on the internet and see if I can find any interesting items I could add to the rice to make it more enjoyable.

Monday's Heat

 

 

I hate it when I lose it complete blog for a day. I don't know what I did I don't know what keys I must have touched or how I allowed myself to have the whole rendering disappear but I did. I could spend all kinds of torturous minutes trying to find out where the 500 plus words evaporated to but I found it over time if it's there time to go it's best to let them go. I choose to forgo the stress trying to resurrect what I lost and just hope that I can follow up with another post.

I slept fairly decent through the night waking up around 3:30 and then again at 5:30ish. That's as good as it gets for me I would be surprised if there is better way to climb onto as much sleep as one can get to get them through the next day. My caregiver and I had a pretty decent morning getting me taken care of dressed and ready for the day. It's always fun to get together and go over our weekends. Even though I didn't go to breakfast yesterday I felt comfortable in letting her know that I'd had a decent weekend and I'd enjoyed the time when I didn't go out to eat but stayed home. I only left the complex once today. I zipped across the street to the coffee shop to get another half pound of my blend of French roast. I'd use the last of it on this morning's coffee. I had enough to make 10 cups- - that's what I always do is 10 cups that gives us coffee during the morning process but lets me have cold coffee for the rest of the two days before I make fresh coffee on Wednesday. I really like going across the street for the coffee even though I know it's more expensive than getting coffee at the market across the street. Just has that old time neighborly feel we're having a coffee shop next door. I struggled a little bit with the door, it's quite a heavy door and some of the folks sitting around the tables got up came out and opened the door for me to roll through. There is nobody in line tonight I came to the door and got the attention of the coffee guy. I placed my order and refined the the order so it was different than the coffee I got the last time which was around too tight and I could barely get the water through the coffee maker. Now I'm excited because I have fresh coffee and I'll be very very interested to see how well it sits through the new ground coffee.

The summer heat has returned and I'm all in favor. In my freezer I have popsicles and about 14 more ice cream sandwiches. We should experience significant heat until the rest are the end of the August month and into September. This summer is basically gone and I hate to see it go. Everyone around the complex is excited that's the cool weather is supposed to move in shortly. I'm kind of surprised these people don't realize that we're probably not going to get a whole lot more Summers that are like the ones we've had up until now. Everything's changing and all we can do is hold on, grit teeth and shoot through… 

Sunday's salute

Mark Anthony had something going this morning so he could not make breakfast and I didn't really want to do breakfast if nobody else was going to be there at the restaurant. My granddaughter is probably still out doing their end of the summer camp out down in St George Utah someplace like that so even if she was around still be someone overwhelmed by her camping experience so I pretty much canceled the breakfast. Typically when this happens I do have breakfast production spam and eggs toast, coffee and I'm sure there's other things that I tend to include on such an event but not today. In truth I wasn't even really hungry this morning. I did goof around in the kitchen a little bit I think I made some peanut butter toast, a couple spoonfuls of my concoction, a handful of grapes some cheese from the cheddar cheese block and some coffee and it was good. I got up around 6:00 because I guess I was done sleeping for the day. I was walking originally around 4:30 and then just stayed in bed and thought about going back to sleep, trying to go back to sleep and never quite make it up. What I did do because I was already in bed and feeling pretty comfy with all the blanks around me I laid very still with my eyes closed until it was nearly 6:00 a.m. in time to get up. The transfer from my bed to the chair was a little challenging but successful in the end. One of the sticks I use for help in my transfers lost its anti-stick capabilities. By the time I had finished with the original stick I set the stick aside we'll come back to begin the process of making. Since I really didn't have anything to do because I wasn't going out to breakfast I really gagged around the apartment all morning not even finishing dressing till about 10:00. I even made my bed this morning like I do every morning usually. Later on this evening I went to the market and was going to get just a can of Chinese food that I could use with my noodles but kind of got carried away. I bought some shrimp lo mein from the frozen section and came home in cooked it up. Of course it was nothing like real Chinese food and a bit of a stretch as far as really good food but it was different and I think I enjoyed the experience. I had food at the house I could have eaten but just didn't seem the same. I was a little late for the 4:30 news watched about half of it however before going through the local news later on. I was doing all this while I was cooking up the Chinese. The world was in the same amount of chaos as it had been since yesterday. Look like the floods are easy enough or the rain is easy enough a little bit and that we're going to try out a little bit before next week when the monsoon season is supposed to kick up again and we start everything all over. I wonder if Noah had had television with the news would have looked like at the beginning of the flood when it rained and rained and rained. I doubt no I would have read or watch too much of the new since he was building the ark and he was on a deadline…

Remembering Saturday

 It was kind of a weird day at least the first part for some reason months again I woke up around 3:30 a.m. and just could not get back to sleep. I was comfortable enough and I wasn't really thinking too much about anything I just couldn't back to sleep. I finally got up around 6:00 and worked at getting dressed. We were doing the coffee shop at 9:00 which turned into 9:30 a.m. and that's good I was pretty much ready by 8:30 gave me time to just rest up a little bit and contemplate my lack of sleep. I've been kind of sluggish all day really haven't wanted to do anything but enjoy my Marvel connections watched a couple movies I'm finished reading the novel I've been working on for the last month or so. It's pretty good read for fiction. A couple of days ago one of the residents here showed the book in my face and said here read this and then we can talk about it. I smiled and gracefully said thank you and looked briefly at the volume. I can't tell if it's an old lady's book or not who knows it might be good I like a lot of younger clit lit who knows maybe there's something in the old volumes as well or volumes written for older people.

As I said the coffee shop is pretty sedate and I sat with Mark and Kevin. We talked mainly about Mark's upcoming trips to the old Soviet Union Block and visiting all of his women friends in that area. You seems totally excited about the whole event. I certainly support his goings and doing whatever he's doing. Certainly interesting it's giving me something to think about. He's got some people in his group that they're looking at developing some kind of business which is interesting I think. I would sure like to have him pull this off and allow him to expand himself and grow. He's doing pretty good just teaching himself Russian and teaches the number of Russian people English as a second language through the median of having them read different volumes. He's currently focused on Harry Potter novels and reading these novels with the Russian speaking individuals trying to learn to speak English. I think it's a pretty good idea I don't know how well it works but we'll have to see on that. It's quite fascinating that his mother's big deal was teaching and the study of linguistics. I think she would be quite interested in what Mark Anthony is doing these days hopefully they would be able to get along. Supposedly he'll be leaving for Russia in a couple weeks. I surely hope he pulls it off and does it safely.

This morning after I gotten up in my chair as I was pulling away from the bed, unbeknownst to me a liar or cord that got caught in one of the back wheels of my power chair. This happens a lot more often than I'd like to admit and when that happens and I'm not aware of it I can tip the whole wardrobe next to the arm bike over. This of course causes a colossal mess and when I need to start getting taken care of. I could wait until Monday morning when Melissa would be back but that's just being plain lazy I can be better than that. I've also broken the lamp That I Used To read with at night after I've gotten ready for bed and dove into the mattress. The lamp is kind of destroyed I can use it I really like it because all I have to do is tap on a certain part of the lamp in the light comes on it's very convenient. Of course I've broken or seemed to have broken off the lamp part from the stand area. I can still use the device but it's not very good it looks pretty tacky. One of my goals next week is to try to find where I can order in a couple new ones. Aside from that I am anticipating a pretty good week…

Summers farewell

 It's not like the temperatures gotten really cold or anything like that but the temperature has dropped 20 or 30° from what it has been when it was in triple digits. Not only has the temperature dropped but dark temperate clouds of moved in as well. It hasn't been raining here where I live but it has been raining large amounts around the state not as bad as some of the states where they're getting like flooding and dangerous going like that but still it's no longer summer heat- the heat that I live for all year long. It's supposed to get back up into the '90s and maybe we'll get another triple digit day before it's all done but I'd be surprised. Today I had to get to the bank/ Credit Union to pull cash out of my account for the weekend or whatever when I don't want to use my card or anything like that you know leaving a trace or something. This means I have to catch the bus and go either across a couple streets west of my apartment complex or a number of streets South quite a ways. Either way it's going to take significant amount of time. I didn't mind I did not have anything else going on today. I went to the branch which is around the corner for my Apartments. I went early enough in the day to where there was no lines to speak of because those that work had not gotten paid yet that would have been later on in the afternoon. What's interesting is the branch that I do go to is also the same branch that many folks who are Hispanic go to this particular branch. They quite enjoy listening to the Spanish being spoken the entire time I'm there and just waiting in line as well as many folks doing business with the teller and such. Like I said I like to have cash around just in case somebody needs something or has something around the apartment complex I want to get a hold of. I have one friend who is really been having some issues trying to keep a job or getting a job even. She needs gas money off and on and many times all give her a $10 bill or whatever just so that she'll have enough gas to get through the weekend or get from her apartment to wherever she's searching for work. I usually get 3 $20 bills and four $10 bills. This gives me enough working capital that I can have some change in my wallet and then have some in a book in my bedroom then pull out of somebody needs a little bit more cash. This also gives me cash that I can give folks who offer to go to the market for me. Having a little cash around always makes me feel stable.

My son kind of surprised me tonight by coming over with a heavy duty power strip. The power strip I had in the corner where I had my big screen, computer and cable connection setup in one corner. Power strip I had there was pretty lightweight at Best in it even showed signs of burning out at one time or another. I'm sure it was divine intervention that snuffed out the fire that look like had attacked this cheap power strip at one time. I have a heavy duty one now and feel much more comfortable..

Thursday thoughts

The temperature barely got to 85° today much cooler than it has been this whole summer especially with the string of 100 plus Degree Days. I knew the temperature at that height would not last but I certainly enjoyed the amount of warm days we've had but now something has changed, something is definitely changed and I sense that autumn/fall is on its way. It looks like we'll be back in the 90s maybe next week but not in the upper 90s lower 90s. I'll be surprised if we see another Triple digit day before next summer. Sadly but kind of interestingly I make that comment by what I've known in the past that happened I think now with global warming Everything's changed nothing's going to be the same lesson used to be. I think the Winter's going to be fairly warm this season. And I don't think we're going to see much in the way of snow or rain for that matter. I get a little nervous watching the evening news now with all the giant storms they're having on the east coast and the middle of the country just tons and tons of water. I'm just waiting for the shoe to drop for us folks here in the West. I think the most obvious is the drought and what we're going to do as far as conserving water enough water to get the people who drink water through let alone beasts and Fields. I'm a little heart in that there are folks that are trying to wrestle these issues and problems and hopefully we'll come up with some usable Solutions here in Utah. Perhaps our old card is the fact that there are so many Mormons here in the state of course. These are the guys who base a lot of their whole food storage on the concept of they'll be great need for such items in the latter days no not only food but water as well. I always default to my own belief of tragedy be falling the state as the Great fault line movement. It's supposed to be super destructive but I don't know if they would actually let the Saints know. Food storage is important but I think what your storage is far more critical. I have a great faith in a couple of the State offices who's the only job is to work with water shortage issues. One of them is actually working with the Great Lake down state that provides a lot of water for the state consumption water. We continue to consume a lot of water in the industrial agricultural side. I know that state is trying to work out those issues as well. Who knows with everybody working on these kind of things perhaps we will be able to develop some scenarios that will take us away from the water shortages I think we're going to be seeing more of in the coming months/ year's.

I'm sitting here desperately waiting for a second wind for probably through the rest of my evening. Sadly I don't think it's coming. I've been sleepy all day doesn't help matter when you wake up at 3:00 a.m. and really don't go back to sleep.

 

Mystery lunch

 

I just finished off the hard boiled egg that you see in the image that I posted with this blog tonight.. I've written about it before and the strange behavior that now she's bringing me over lunches once a week it seems like. Today's meal consisted of a boiled egg rice a boiled potato some kind of soup and mystery meat. The mystery meat potato and egg was in this bowl of broth of some sort I didn't need it but I did fish out the other things and put them all on one plate ate a little bit for lunch and then put the rest in for dinner and perhaps lunch tomorrow. This person speaks very little English we've gotten to get by with basic words and hand signals and such. She's quite elderly but she lives independently at the apartment complex just down the hall. These are great little meals that she prepares and usually there's enough to make at least two meals out of the offering. I don't know why she's doing this her if she has any expectations. She checks up on me to see if I've eaten the food or not that she's left. I don't know if she understands me when I tell her that I've only eating partial and want to eat the rest for dinner or another meal. She seems to understand the nods and agreement and then leaves it's really kind of strange. I will however keep accepting the meals cuz it's really nice to have a full course meal every once in awhile. I certainly wouldn't make this for myself which is kind of too bad. Now, I would make this for somebody else but not for me. 

This meal was kind of the high point of my day until later on in the evening when I got a text from my son who wanted to come over and help clean up the apartment a little bit. Luckily, my granddaughter had been over earlier last week and did a great job cleaning up the place and it was still pretty clean when my son got here however he went to work on the refrigerator. The refrigerator is a real challenge for me as far as keeping things clean or even orderly inside. The fridge is real difficult to get close enough in the wheelchair to really get things in and out and somewhat orderly. Many things that existed my refrigerator are dead and it was a long slow cold death for these poor pieces of Forgotten food. There's also the science experiments that also seem to be living quite well in the fridge. He even pulled out the vegetable drawers at the bottom where what materials had gone and dried up it took a minute or two to get those things soaked to the point that they were movable. But the best part was just having somebody who could reach in and grab stuff I couldn't and throw the stuff away which many times are things I couldn't do either just because I'm restricted from respecting the “use by date”. I think more than even having his help to clean the fridge was just spending time with him and visiting with him this Wednesday evening

Dark 30 earlier and earlier

 It's 8:30 and it's almost dark outside! It's funny how all of a sudden you become aware of the change and you realize now heading towards autumn at seemingly greater speed. I mean after all a month ago would have been 30 some days so it'll be 9:00 before it was this dark now it's 8:30 and 30 more days it'll be 7:30- - that can't be right but who knows we'll see. Because I went out last night the date that I had for lunch today didn't happen cuz it happened last night for dinner. Anyway I guess the point that I'm making is that I didn't have anything really to do today. The constant reader will remember that usually on Tuesdays I am downtown Salt Lake at assist Inc office. That gets me up in the morning forces me to be ready by a certain time in order to go down to the bus stop catch the bus into the train to get into Salt Lake by 11:00 a.m. which is the usual time. However the coordinator of the program is gone this week so there's no meeting believe in me with a whole day on my hands. Sadly and it's almost a confession I didn't do anything with today except maybe watch a couple movies. I really hate to admit that. I did my usual however I did my 60 Minutes on the arm bike and that took out a chunk of the day no listen to a number of my favorite shows on NPR. Once again I could take the little road and suggest that what I'm really doing is nothing because I need to lay back in my chair to take the weight off of my butt because of my possible pressure issues. This is my justification for watching so many movies is that I do it with my chair situated in such a situation where I'm lying back and the pressure's off my bottom. I justify my lack of doing things that way plus I'm rather cautious on how much I use my power chair because of the batteries that are not perfect anymore. This reminds me I did get a call today I saw I was from IHC my wheelchair place. I imagine they want me to schedule the time for them to pick up my chair to get it worked on. I've become so complacent that I don't care really. Even with the failing batteries that's in this chair now I'm doing good to get from A to B power wise. I will have to call them tomorrow and see when they can schedule I think I probably lost the window for this week. And that's on me.

Tomorrow my routine clicks back on. Lisa will be here kind of early to do my Wednesday routine and then dressed and ready to go I'll have to wait around until the wash is done and retrieve the clothes from the dryer- - remember she takes the clothes from the washing machine until it's been the dryer before she leaves. I get the clothes take them back to the apartment and if I'm really focused I will fold them and hang them on hangers and free up the clothes basket. I guess I will be responsible and called I see people and schedule my chair pickup. If I can do all those I'll feel like I've done something for my Wednesday. I doubt if I'll go to a movie at all the next couple days I've seen everything once or twice. I almost might go back to the Odyssey but I don't know if I could stand two more hours of those guys though I do like the actors it's just 2 hours and some minutes is a long time and it's kind of cold inside the theater…

Dark foreboding

Looks like we're getting ready to experience another brief mini monsoon season. More and more moisture is being pumped into our air systems and that means more and more big clouds. So far, as far as I'm concerned, all this has been for show. We get a few big clouds they tend to Bunch up in one area of the sky or another turn mincingly gray and black and winds begin to drop down but the option of precipitation quickly minimizes tonight I was having dinner with a friend and all through dinner I watched clouds Bunch up become dark and threatening and a refreshing downwind came from all thier bunching up . I hate to see a good storm gone bad. I should be grateful that these bunch of clouds were not throwing off great jagged shards of lightning. I do miss the Thunder however that seems to accompany these large lightning bolts. I didn't hear any thunder tonight and last night. It seems the lightning bolts are all around the the area just not in the Salt Lake area. Hopefully that will change before this mini monsoon season ceases to exist. Luckily for me I don't have anywhere  to tomorrow , in fact I really don't have anything for the rest of the week. Last week Andreas canceled the meeting for this week. There is a chance of possible rain showers thunder showers tomorrow. I doubt they'll be a full-blown thunderstorm but one never knows this time of the summer. My plan for tomorrow is to spend a lot of the time in my chair laying the chair Downs much as I can to take the weight off my butt. My caregiver insists there's nothing on my butt cheeks but it seems like I can feel something. If after a couple days of favoring the hip it doesn't show signs of less discomfort maybe I will schedule a trip into the InstaCare or whatever cause I Medical support system I can get myself into. The only problem is if I'm being seen for something superficial and easily accessed no problem but if the issue is someplace that is not easily accessed, somewhere that I'd have to leave my chair to get onto an exam table of some sort that's a whole nother story. It kind of frustrates me it's an old frustration that these professional folks that wanted to take your money they want to become physically involved too much. They don't invest in things like body lifts and things that could assist someone like myself leave my chair and get on to the table. It's like if you can't physically get yourself to where they want you- - and they're not going to help – then you might as well not even go in. So my plan is to weigh my chair out in front of the big screen and watch Marvel movies till I can't stand it any longer and then maybe read for one of my good books or the other way around. The phone were very technical and creative one could actually Lobby this issue into a Ada issue but that's pretty weak these days as well since the current leader of the great country is dismantling all the support for folks who really need the most. Bottom line isn't this passive murder? Wow this really turned dark but I call it a night..

 

Summer storms and clean apartment

 I've rattled on before and past years about how much I enjoy a summer storm in the evenings. I like to watch the clouds build up during the day the day by cumulative clouds Stack Up turn dark gray the wind comes up especially on the hot days. Tonight was one of those nights for me in fact I was just settling down to write tonight's blog post and all the sudden I smelled green rain that distinct smell you get when water hits concrete on a hot day. Coming down but I wasn't sure so I went out and realized there was a storm brewing Maybe. Warm Winds were blowing the trees around our apartment complex and it was just a very high energy evening. And all the time I was out I only saw lightning once and didn't hear any Thunder which doesn't mean there wasn't any but I didn't witness or hear anything. I got caught by a couple of my apartment folks that were outside as well and we end up having quite a discussion about rain and concrete and the smell of a storm. The wind kept blowing and it was hard to break free from the moment or moments we are having. It was kind of a perfect ending to Hot August Sunday. 

Earlier in the day, it's Sunday of course, I'm at the kids for breakfast at the usual joint. I was surprised that when I got to the restaurant my granddaughter was already there. I'm usually the first to get to the restaurant but she'd gotten there and staked out our table. My son ended up joining us and we had a great conversation and probably hung out for about an hour and a half at least maybe even 2 hours by the time we were finished yammering. Then my son had to go to a function he was working at and then the granddaughter was coming over to my apartment to finish your project which started a couple of Sundays ago. I was amazed because soon she was totally involved and cleaning the apartment. I would not say it was a deep clean but she was certainly working hard on the project. She spent time cleaning the table off which was and is always a major project everything lands on my table. Then she actually swept the floors then drug out the mop and mopped the floors all through the apartment. It's not like it's a big apartment it's pretty small so I guess it's not that big of a job for me sitting down. When I try to do this job I can do it to a point but then I start rolling over the wet surface and my wheels leave tracks all over my work but when my granddaughter does the floor it dries before I get back onto it and I don't really the face all the work she's put into the project. I think she spent another 2 hours working on my apartment. She did such a good job all I ended up paying her was an ice cream sandwich, see last night's entry or maybe night before last.

Watermelon Saturday

 

I am almost certain that I've got some kind of bladder infection, I only realized that I most likely have the infection this afternoon when I realized once again that feel like I have to pee real bad then when I try to nothing happens or just very little urine comes out. This is really beginning to Spook me until I realized that Witnesses happened before to me, and it has it seems many times, I ended up going to the doc who wrote me some kind of script that sorted cleans everything up and soon I'm able to sleep through the night again. Now I'm doing that weird phenomenon of where I wake up way early in the morning feeling that I've got to pee and then going through the process only to realize that there's no urine going to come. I don't know if I want to wait until Monday when I can just go to my regular doc or if I should just go to InstaCare type place. I'm not quite sure remember where the InstaCare place is but I know it's not too far from my apartment it seems the last time I went it was quite cold so the heat would be the upside to this whole situation. In fact I just turned off the air conditioner to my apartment. I've had it on low for the last couple of days because I had it on for my caregiver on Friday and then have forgotten to turn it off but I have not been please with how cool or cold it makes the apartment. Sometimes I feel a bit ashamed because I'm too lazy to get up and do something that would make my situation so much more enjoyable. I've really been trying to keep a closer watch on my use of air conditioning this summer. Last year I used the air conditioner just a few days out of the whole summer and this summer, so far, I think I've used it more than last year. It's nice when I'm super hot but just for chilling- - excuse the pun - - or when other people are coming to visit one way or the other I can bring a temperature down in the apartment and it makes me look good, like I'm sacrificing something for the person or people who are visiting me.

Yesterday I was sitting out by the parking lot, like I always do in order to keep warm, and one of the neighbors walked past an indicating that she was going to the market did I need anything. I asked if she could get a watermelon telling her that I would split the watermelon with her. She did get the watermelon it's a nice watermelon fairly good size. I already visited with my neighbor across the hall earlier this week indicating that that would be happy to go half on the watermelon with her. I don't think she really believed me you know just one of those things people say- - but I was serious. Anyway, after the lady who offered to buy the watermelon left said fruit on my kitchen table. I was nowhere to be found when she came back from the market cuz I was across the street shopping myself. It's a fairly big watermelon and I've learned that I don't do well cutting watermelons in the first place let alone large ones. They just get out of control for me. So I was finally able to get my neighbor to let her know that I had the watermelon would you come over and cut it in half. I had a feeling large dinner right and I'm a little bit sleepy now so I don't think I have the energy to process the watermelon tonight and I don't know if it's a project I want to take on over it Sunday but you leave me just Monday the earliest day I could cut the watermelon off the rind and save it in the right kind of bowls in the refrigerator. Things I've learned about myself is once that something like this is processed it's in the refrigerator I tend not to be too interested in it anymore. However, I love watermelon and I'm going to force myself to eat as much as I can once I get it to the point where it's easily cut off it's rind make it a fairly easy to have watermelon and cheese in the evenings. I'm always amazed at how much I piss after I eat watermelon. It makes sense , Ergo the name watermelon.

Chasing Ice Cream

 

 The temperatures have ticked back up to the triple digits. Today we reached 103° which really isn't a lot but my local standards it's enough to make the news at least three times a day. Anyway the harp on just how he is that sometimes you do things that are so much stupid and that's what I have done. The other they or should I say the other hot spell I saw what I thought was a deal in the Frozen section of the local market and that was a whole box of Meadowgold gold ice cream bars and the rapper look just like the creamery and milk company in Boise where I grew up. I guess I'm a sucker for sedimentality. Even more important was there's 24 ice cream bars in the Box at the same price of 12 of the local brand. I thought I was being somewhat clever pulling this off as I stuck the box of ice cream bars in my freezer. I've had two or three of the ice cream bars now and each and every time I tried to unwrap the ice cream bar I failed and only got in the portion of the ice cream bar exposed by the time the whole thing started melting on me. I've gotten so I'm somewhat hesitant to even dive into the bars. Fortunately for me, and my caregiver likes these ice cream bars helps yourself to one off and on when she's waiting for me to finish my business on the toilet. I also thought about taking a couple of them over to my neighbors to help me get through this box. 24 bars are a lot of calories especially when you start eating one tonight which I'm tempted to do. I just hold myself back have a bar maybe once or twice every week.

I ate my ice cream sandwich tonight again I noticed how quickly the chocolate  like wafer that the ice cream sits in the middle of, begins to disintegrate and get soggy making it most difficult too finish unwrapping the cool summer treat. Going to the internet of course and there was a fairly decent answer there as far as how many people have this problem- - which totally surprises me. I thought perhaps the freezer portion of the freezer is not turned High Enough and the  iron coupled with the body temperature leads to a quick meltdown. Whatever is the problem it's a mess maker and I don't get the entire benefit of the ice cream bar. I don't think the Wafers are as thick or as crisp I used to be either. My mother had this unique way of finding things that were available in bulk sizes. One day she brought home two large bags of chocolate wafers from a local Cream Dairy Outlet that made ice cream bars. These Wafers were Rejects they were really good like a chocolate cookie but they had small defects that made them unusable for their regular product. We had these for a couple weeks before they all got eaten and I remember them being somewhat crisp it would take something like ice cream a long time to melt through it. I think they've changed their makeup just like everything else.

 

Just a feeling

 I seem to be coming such a worry wort I can barely stand it. I am surprised by caregiver keep showing up because every time she comes in she can see that I've been worried about something. Last couple of nights I've been waking up very early last night I woke up, or should I say this morning, I woke up around 3:00 a.m. I never really got back to sleep. But it's really weird is that I have felt okay through the day and I've been a very busy person today. Two bus trips and socialization coffee and working on my arm bike to finish my workout for the week 200 minutes. Just turned 9:00 p.m. and now I'm getting a second wind. I don't plan to stay up much later but it seems like I should be feeling worse than I am. And I just feel like something the Dreadful is around the corner. I could be suffering from the news I got yesterday of my brother's blood cancer. That could be it and I can see how that would influence my sleep as well. Having said all the above I must admit that my transfer this morning was better than usual as well as the self-dressing. I even wore both shoes today which is unique. I have just not been able to get my left foot up high enough on my leg to slip the other shoe on or have it stay on when I push the leg off my leg back to the Box. Often I'll have a spasm in the leg will kick the shoe off but not today so that's a good sign. I just hope I'm able to sleep tonight and do some catch up. I guess the best thing I should take away from these issues is that I get by. I guess I should worry more if I were the suddenly stop being able to make the transfer from the bed to the chair or actually land on the floor. Yesterday for a short minute I felt my leg go between the bed and the power chair and I found in the past where that happens I'm almost a goner. I either have to stay that way until my caregiver gets here or I have to call someone and the worst case scenario is the 911 folks. It's been 10 years since I've been to this place I still don't know enough people I could call on or even how to get a hold of them if I were to have an emergency like this again. But should really boost my ego and concept of being independent is the fact that I have been nearly independent for the entire time I've been here which I think would be more than like 3,000 days or more that says a lot. Oh, I've had the fire trucks come out a couple times no more than five I don't think. Tomorrow's Friday that means Melissa will be here for my shower, toileting and dressing. After that it's Saturday and Sunday and I dress myself but I think I'm going to do okay .,,psis I just have a feeling

Sad day Wednesday

What A Strange Day! It started out extremely early I woke up around 3:00 a.m. and really couldn't get back to sleep. I must have dozed off once or twice before we reached 6:00 a.m. but it was kind of hard but I was excited kind of today is my brother's birthday. We're not super close kind of just because and we always pretty much stuck together. I still have a weird feeling about the call. I couldn't find the phone number at first I had to really work at it to make sure I got the right phone number. He has a home phone but never answers it he answers pretty much only to his cell phone I didn't have that number I left a message and eventually got back with me. During the conversation where I did the happy birthday thing he informed me that he's got cancer, some kind of blood cancer which indicates has no cure or at least that's what they told him. He said he's had it for some time but this is the first time he's ever let me know about it and it kind of freaks me out there's no question about that. He's a veteran and he goes to the VA a lot and I think he's been doing the VA Hospital thing for this whole cancer trip which kind of makes sense that he has those options. Either way he's a short timer but who is not a short timer at this point. He's 5 years older than me that means he's 80 years old that's a good run it's going to be probably better than I get. He says he's not in too much pain a little discomfort but who knows what that really means. I wish I was closer as far as physically being closer to Boise so I can actually visit him. I didn't really think I'd get back to Boise and I still don't know how I would but that might be something just going to have to work out. When he passes unless something else happens to one of the family until then he'll be the first to go then I guess it'll be like floodgates opening up. I don't know at all but it wouldn't surprise me except for the oldest brother who died quite a while ago and really wasn't too integrated with the rest of the family this should be the first close one to go. I think I'm just babbling now.

I really wanted to get more done today than I did. It's Wednesday and that means it's wash day. That pretty much links me to the apartment complex until I at least get the clothes out of the dryer. Melissa takes the clothes from the washer it closer in the dryer before she leaves then about an hour later I check the dryer take out the clothes get back to my room and then fold them. I was pretty straightforward today got them done probably about 1:00 or 2:00 but then I just didn't have the momentum to head out and catch the bus and go look for a new lanyard to hold my bus pass in since I destroyed the other one last week. This of course is at the same time that I've got to deposit the check that I got from my volunteer work with assist. It's not a lot and it's not like a salary it's more like and honorarium I forget the other word it's used for that. Still 60 bucks is 60 bucks I'll dump most of it into the account and take 10 out for fun…

Words words words

Tuesdays Thursdays Saturdays and Sundays are my hard days. I think I've talked about it before but these are the days that I have no morning help coming in to assist me getting up actually to assist me go to the toilet and shower, I'm usually up by the time she gets here. For the longest time I had no problems getting out of the bed and in the chair and getting dressed actually but something's changed I've talked about this before. I sort of think it might be my foot box and it might be lower but then there I go conjecturing I don't know all I know is that I can't get my leg up over my other leg as easily as I used to and can't get my shoes on as easily as I used to in fact I'm almost not wearing a shoe on my left foot on these days just because I can't get it up over my other leg like I used to be able to. I know it sounds like I'm whining and I probably am but that's the feelings that I'm getting and sometimes a little frightening other times I realize if I work on the project of getting dressed long enough I can get dressed at least enough to pass at being dressed. I have this weird mindset that if I wear one shoe it's permissible people will believe that there's something wrong with my other foot. That's the reason I'm not wearing a shoe on that foot. Sometimes I balance my shoe on top of that foot along with my backpack and everything else and hope that somewhere along the line someone might put that shoe on my foot. Sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn't but it certainly worth a try.

I need to start carrying a jug of water with me wherever I go. I'm just not ingesting enough water through the day to really do good things for my kidneys and such. Each day I start the day with the idea that I'm going to drink lots of water today or liquid doesn't necessarily have to be water. However I get to the end of the day and realize I've just had a couple gulps here or a cup of gulps there just enough to keep dry mouth away and this cannot be good. But I'm not in pain or discomfort and it seems like if I was doing something really destructive especially something like losing my kidneys are bladder or whatever I would feel it more. As it is, I just drain my bladder when I get the Sensation that I need to. Since I was diagnosed as pre-diabetic I guess there's probably some kind of liquid I should be ingesting on that as well and not let the diabetes take over my system. The other side of that coin of drinking liquids all the time is that what goes in eventually has to come out. I have an unlimited hand function and having the place find the dick every time I want to go to the bathroom makes it a little bit challenging on the street even finding an accessible bathroom it's still a bit of a challenge and then being able to use that bathroom long enough to do the job. It takes me awhile. It's probably subconscious justification but then I don't drink water because I don't want to have to pee while I'm out and about. That I need to get over cuz if I don't start drinking more I'm going to be in big trouble.

One of the best parts of my day was when I realized that I was going to have more than enough power in my chair to get to my meeting downtown and Back Again. In fact I was so sure myself I didn't even pack the charger like I thought I might. With all the assists that mean the bus and the train and such by the time I got to the office I'd only used about 5/10 of a mile of power by the time I gotten pretty much to the college coming home I I've gone about 1.3 miles I felt so sure myself I didn't even take the 217 like I was thinking and just drove the rest of the way home stopping at a number of stores looking for an item that I'm trying to find. But I got home there was lunch sitting on my table white rice some kind of meat product covered in gravy and some interesting potato salad. It was all very good it was all very cold she must have delivered it very early mid-morning or late mid morning. That's okay I ate half and saved a little bit for later. Then later in the afternoon there is a knock on my door and the lady ate from upstairs and brought me down a bowl of lentil soup along with some kind of dessert a cream pie which is really good after a day traveling and I really didn't eat anything while I was out. So it's been a pretty good. But now I'm tired and ready for sleep

 

Monday moans

I'm still trying to clean the apartment phase that's the phase where everything's so clean in the apartment that you don't want to do anything for fear of messing it up. For me I want to cook a breakfast fried spam and eggs but to do that I would have to get the frying pan out put it on the stove and cook the spam and the eggs somewhere along the line I know I would get something splashed over the side either onto the burner top or on the frying pan. This would mean that I or somebody else would have to wash the frying pan again before it could be used. I don't know what I fear most a dirty frying pan in the sink soaking waiting to be washed or I washed frying pan just really looking for a place to hang out until it's going to be used again. I could we hang it on the rack but I know I would or I doubt that I would really do that because of the energy it would take to go from the frying pan in the sink wet and wanting to be hung up. I would probably just leave it on the stove top and wait for the surge of energy to wash the frying pan up so it could be used again shortly. But I keep forgetting every time I open the refrigerator doors that I've got a meal from take home Sunday when we went to the restaurant and I scarfed everybody's plates when they are all done which left me a full styrofoam box of food including my large pancake that I never got around to eating. So I think I know what I'll have for breakfast tomorrow before I head out to my meeting at assist. Couple Fork Falls of pancake or fried potatoes and sausages that were all part of the scrape off into the styrofoam box before we left the restaurant. I forgot that box was in the refrigerator till after I made myself breakfast this morning: a cheddar cheese covered burrito with crisp Chinese noodles. Tomorrow will be better anyway because I will feel the pressure to get out and catch the bus to go into my meeting downtown. I believe I've shared the sediment before that I'm a little worried about the battery or batteries in this chair and their capabilities of holding a charge long enough to get me there and Back Again. Remember I used this is the excuse last week to skip the meeting because I was afraid that I would be stranded with my bad batteries. But when I got the batteries back from the wheelchair shop they indicated that one battery was failing and the other battery was good. And I've been watching the distance I've been traveling the last couple days on a single charge that looks like I should be okay. I'll pack up the charger and drag it in with me just in case I'm out of juice and I need to charge it just to get home.

 

It could have been disastrous

 This day started out with what could have been a disaster. You, dedicated reader, no that usually on Sundays I get up a little bit earlier because I tried to get totally dressed and ready to go by 7:30 so I can make the 8:00 breakfast appointment at the local restaurant. Today I started at usual about 4:55 something like that and then when I went to make the transfer for the bed to the chair I still don't know what happened but the cushion wasn't fastened or whatever like it usually was or is and the whole cushion slipped underneath my weight as I transferred from the bed on to the cushion 3/4 of the cushion was left hanging off of the chair and I was sort of just basically on a little bit of the cushion that was still on the chair and I didn't have anywhere to go except down. This has happened sort of in the past and I've been able to lay the chair down or lay the back down and with a stick or whatever push the cushion back underneath me when I try to bridge but that didn't work on this one and I knew I was a goner I was going to have to call somebody or something. Then I figured well well I tried getting back on the bed and starting over again but I can still do that with the lowering in the bed back to its down position then in a leap roll back on the bed which I did then start the process all over again this time however pushing the cushion back as far as it would go in the bed of the chair. It took me 45 minutes at least to do this procedure but I did it and I rolled back and I was able to make the transfer I put out a couple calls with Alexa but nobody responded and that turned out to be okay. It seem to take me a bit longer than usual to get dressed and such but surprisingly I was ready to go by 7:45 a.m. amazing! In fact I got to the restaurant way before everybody else and waited for about 20 minutes before the rest of the crew showed up. 

The previous event was pretty huge in my estimation especially since I was able to pull my own self out of a problem myself. But I think the best part of this day was that following breakfast Jasmine and Jackson volunteered to come over to my apartment. Did ask me if there was anything I needed to have done and there really is I've had a case of spam on the top shelf and my cabinet that I couldn't reach any more cans to pull out I need to have this spam empty before I could reach it since I really do use a lot of spam when I have access I feel like cooking. But of course once the kids got here they went right to work cleaning up the place putting things in order sweeping the floor and doing whatever I ask that needs to be done around the corner, dishes were done countertops were dusted off and washed down as well as the top of the stove top which can get pretty Grody sometimes. A lot of elbow grease went into some of the items they cleaned. They also got rid of a lot of useless stuff on my tabletop and set the rest of what was left in order making it look very tidy and very useful I was truly blessed today from disaster aversion to apartment clean up I am one lucky dude!

August again

First day of August and it was Triple digit Saturday temperature wise. It was hot but not so hot that I couldn't function outside in fact I went again to the new Spider-Man movie to see if it made more since the second time particularly if I see the movie from the beginning and it kind of did. I kind of surprised myself because I stayed for the whole thing I was just going to watch the first part of the the movie that I missed but I really like the way the movie ended so I ended up staying. It was hot when I left and I'm sure it was already in the triple digits but I got to the bus stop okay and waited patiently for the bus which probably did come and for once I really enjoyed the cool vehicle.

I kind of freaked myself out this morning as I was getting dressed for the day when I noticed blood on one of my feet. Remember how I lift one leg over the other leg to get the pants on and the shoe and such? I guess I am using too much exertion on the stick that raises my leg or my skin is becoming so frail that it's just breaking off I'm breaking up. So now I've got wounds kind of on my foot as well as on the other leg where I think I burned myself the other day when I had my legs under the sink and didn't realize the sink was hot until it may have been too late. So like I said it kind of freaked me out this morning but getting through the day I'm feeling a lot less frail and maybe not needing to see the wound person like I was all ready to do this morning. Luckily it was a Saturday. I'm still having issues with my butt but I keep applying the cream and it seems to be helping a great deal. I still saw batches of blood on pad this morning when I got up but my caregiver swears that she doesn't see any skin breakdown when she's attended to my butt and she's looking really close. I totally believe her. I'm still going to play it safe as soon as I get better batteries in my chair I think I'm going to go into the wound clinic at least get their input on what seems to be happening and how concerned I need to be not only with my butt but with my legs and anything else my skin seems to be breaking down.

I had coffee this morning with mark Anthony. He had contacted me earlier indicating that he is up to meeting me for coffee. He texted me and this time I was able to catch the text. Last week he texted that he and Kevin were going to be there and I didn't see it and I didn't show up. So this week we had a pretty decent discussion and enjoyed each other's company for early coffee. About more coffee for the apartment just so I wouldn't be caught short next week. So between the coffee shop and the movie experience I think I can relate that I had a fairly decent weekend to whoever might ask..