The Dawg Days of Summer

Just a cool reminder of cold days past! It used to be hot for the last couple of weeks in August but these days the heat seems to start in May. Thank goodness for my fans, that's all I can say. I've been mostly eating a lot of fruit & salads so I don't have to cook & heat up the place but the occasional pot of soup is still mighty tasty on the cooler days. I can't imagine life without the microwave especially on these hot days! 

While moving stuff about in the fridge, I found a package of ground meat. Guess I'm making Fried Rice for lunch & Beef & Broccoli for dinner!! I'm not crazy about cooking in this heat but stir fry is fast & delicious & not overloaded with salt if you make your own.

Not much going on around the old Shack. Ron is still sick - he dropped in yesterday after dragging himself to work for a half day - I took one look & ordered him out & home to bed. He looked terrible. I gave him a half hour & called to make sure he made it home!! He had. And he promised to warm up some chicken noodle soup & go to bed. I'll call his roomie if I don't hear from him today.

Mike is off to his trailer this weekend. He needs the break because he was looking awful on Thursday evening! What is it with the men in my life?? I guess it's easy for me laying in the recliner without a worry - more or less - while they struggle with the cost of living. I hope he lays about himself this weekend & relaxes .  .  .  he did say he might come home the back way via Chester's Chicken & bring me a treat! I'll take it! even though I'm not supposed to eat that stuff anymore .  .  . hahaha

Knitting - I found the cardigan I started before my hospital visit. Lucky for me, I'd stuffed it into a large Ziplock bag so it didn't get disturbed when my niece cleaned up. My washcloth-in-progress somehow lost it's circular needle .  .  .  but the cardigan is okay. I'm to the top of the shoulder working my way down to the armhole. I'm using a simple garter stitch with an increase pattern from Deb Gemmel's book "Need a Plus Sized Cardigan?". I simply use a yarn-over for the increase which makes a series of holes for interest. I'm using Briggs & Little's Sport which is 100% wool singles yarn. And yes, it feels scratchy and yes, it has bits of VM in it. But the yarn softens as you work with it, the VM falls out or you can pick it out & it's 'sticky' so it's pretty hard to drop a stitch which makes it perfect for colorwork! And it's Canadian, from sheep to yarn.

More Cooking

I ate chicken & veggies for three days! I got mightily sick of chicken & dialed up Door Dash to bring me some Fish Pakoras & samosas. I love the fish! And then I made Italian Soup. Today for breakfast, I ate the last of it. Mike brought me Mexican Chipotle tofu sausages instead of the Spicy Italian ones but I used them anyhow. A large can of diced tomatoes, 2 cans of water, a package of Onion soup mix, fried garlic & dry red onions went into the pot with the sliced up Mexican sausages. I let it simmer all afternoon until it smelled wonderful before adding a half cup of large couscous. After 15 minutes, I tossed in three cups of diced zucchini, stirred it & turned off the heat. I let it stand for around 15 minutes to partially cook the zucchini & ate some. WOW. The Mexican sausage really spiced it up! I loved it. And ate it for two days .  .  .  

Hey, I'm surprised I have the energy to make anything!! And soup is good for you. hahaha  I think it's time for Fish Chowder! And I might start thinking about Stir Frying again. My O2 is into the 90s! Most of the time I'm between 94 & 96 percent! What a change. Now if I could just work the stiffness out of my legs in the mornings .  .  .  where's a damn hot tub when I could use one???

Other than cooking adventures, nothing much has changed. I still haven't had my blood test but I guess that's coming this week. Someone did call & try to set up an appointment for this morning at 7:30!!! Gad! But they had the wrong address & mine was out of their district so I was off the hook.  At least they won't come earlier than 7:30, gasp. Not like the hospital where I'd been woken up before 6 for a blood test .  .  .  .

This morning was very chilly so tomorrow, I'm getting out the cardigan I started before the heat wave & getting back to work. I might even cast on for a new pair of socks. Knitting season will be here very shortly. 

Home for a Whole Week

 
It's been a whole week today since I got released from hospital! Not much has happened but a whole lot of changes have occurred. I'm steadier on my feet. I cooked chicken yesterday - a whole lot of chicken - but I'll get several meals from it. Mike is off this weekend with his camper & girlfriend to a mud crawl something, which is the last of the season. My friend Ron is down with some scourge that has him laid right out. My niece is moving so I'm on my own. I haven't told anyone but I have the sorest throat this morning & I'm sneezing up a storm. I figure it's allergies once more - at least I hope so - I do NOT want to get sick & wind up in the hospital again!!!

The doctors have sort of decided on my medication routine. No one has booked the mobile lab yet for my weekly blood test but I'm sure that's next. I've talked to three Pharmacists, two Doctors, a Nurse, the Oxygen Therapist & Oxygen Tech. I have an appointment with a Cardiologist in September & my Doctor is doing a house call in September. Whoopie, I am popular.

Meanwhile, I've finally sorted most of my email. What a ton of crap with a few nuggets of information. One of my friends sent me an email - he spends half the year in Cuba & has just returned. He has a lot of really good friends there & sponsors a baseball team! Last year he bought a little house because he loves Cuba so much. He spends 3 months at a time there & then comes home to work for three or four months. I don't think I've ever seen him happier in all the years I've known him. 

Craig Johnston sent me a message about the annual gathering to celebrate Walt Longmire. I'd love to go but it's too dry & dusty & I'd have to take an O2 truck with me .  .  .  In case you don't know, Walt Longmire is the Sheriff of Absaroka county in Wyoming. He's rough, tough, sensitive, & has his problems with alcohol & women. But he's well liked & admired by most people in the County, but not all of them. If you've ever seen the old  Rockford Files, put boots, jeans, guns, a Sheriff's badge, a ratty old  cowboy hat & a day's growth on James Garner & you'd have Walt Longmire. I've read all the books!

Spin Off & Ply magazine have been sending interesting messages about Gatherings. I never had the money to go when I was healthy & now that I can afford to go .  .  .  well, I'm not able, sigh. Do it when you're healthy folks, don't wait until you retire. 

Finally got my summer haircut the other day!!! After being in the hospital with ratty, dirty hair, I just had to get it cut. Dona will visit & cut it because I do her household's taxes. I now have a crew cut with a little extra on top. I can wash it in the sink with a face cloth. I can put a little gel in the top & spike it if I want. I love it.

Now if I can just get back to knitting & spinning.

One Day at a Time

Gad, here it is, several days later! I admit I struggled a lot the first couple of days - you don't lay on your back for a month & then pop back into your life without some problems!! I did not miss waking up at 5:30 in the morning or trying to sleep in an overheated room. I still miss someone else deciding which pills I take & which time I take them. I also miss the meal service & the ice chips. There's none of that here. Mike dropped in & brought me a Timmie's coffee, the first coffee I've had in a month! Tasted soooo good!

Not much in the old fridge. Some ham in a vacuum pack, a large Cottage Cheese, a couple of stir fry meals & a big container of cleaned, halved Brussels Sprouts. There was a big hunk of cheese & a bag of baby potatoes hidden away too. Luckily, I ordered a box of Indian mini-meals in pouches from Amazon!! I had all kinds of Butter Chickpeas, Mild Curried Sweet Potatoes & Peas & Cheese in microwavable packets. They all taste great over baby spuds, rice, pasta or on their own with tortillas to dip into them. I wish there were more types of food in a pouch to microwave but I make do with what I have.

I discovered last night that the freezer is stuffed with chicken in small zip lock bags! Where did that come from?? I do have lots of cream of Chicken or Mushroom soup. Before I went into hospital, I ordered a lot of low sodium broth in litre packs. So I have the makings of many Meal-in-one-Skillet or quick soups. I think I might be up to it now that I can breathe a lot better.

The Vital Air folks - they supply my mobile air & cannisters of O2 as well as my home Compressor - came by & changed the valve on my mobile tank. I now must have direct flow O2 all the time I am moving outside the home instead of giving me O2 only when I breathe in. This means the tank will only give me 66 minutes of O2 instead of 4.5 hours at the old rate. I'll need two tanks just to go to the doctor!! Not a happy thing since Frank, my walker, only has one holder. Maybe Mike can put another one on. What a pain. Maybe my days of going out for a coffee are over .  .  .

Return to Civilization

I'm back from what I thought was to be a brief visit to the emergency because I couldn't breathe in the heat. I thought they'd put me on a nose cone of meds to open everything up. Instead, they called me an emergency & hiked me into critical care & hooked me up!! Apparently, I was in heart failure. Ooops. I've never really understood 'crisis' but I sure do now!! My CO2 levels were really high & O2 levels low. You can't do that for very long & live - especially when you're filling up with fluid & the old ticker is skipping a beat now & then.

To make a long story short, I blew up like a great white whale, couldn't breathe & spent another month in the hospital while they got the fluid, heart, blood & gases adjusted back to normal. I'm still full of fluid but my O2 levels are so good, 96%, that even I can't believe it. I can stand longer, walk further & do more than I have in ages! But I'm tied to a BiPAP machine every night. It forces me to breathe deeply & consistently so I clear the CO2 out of my lungs & brings my O2 up. What a life!!

My buddy Mike kept my house plants alive while I was gone which is extraordinary!!! He is NOT a plant person at all. My niece cleaned out my house & washed everything - including the dusty drapes which shouldn't be washed in the machine!!! hahahaha  She wanted no dust in the house for aunty. I am so grateful to them both.

I wish I had more to report but I lost another month in the Surrey Hospital. It was harder to get out of that place than it was to get admitted!! I thought I'd be there forever. But, I'm back home with my stash & more energy. Who knows, maybe I'll be able to spin again soon.