Category Archives: Health

Health

Heart Procedure Tomorrow

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It’s strong, and still ticking, but something ain’t quite right.

I don’t think I’ve written before about the heart concerns I’ve had for the last ten months. It started last June 1, when we were driving back to Arkansas from Orlando FL. We stopped for the night at a hotel in Meridian, MS. After checking in and getting the luggage to the room—which involved a lot of steps but no heavy lifting, I took a drink of tap water, and almost immediately felt pains on my right side, in the shoulder, armpit, going down my arm, and on the right side of my neck and under my jaw. The pain started slowly, I think about 8:00 p.m., and expanded its territory slowly.

I know enough about heart attack symptoms to know this wasn’t good. But here I was in a strange city for the first time, not knowing where a hospital was. Lynda was very tired from the trip and was out like a light as soon as she got in bed to read. What should I do? The pain was obvious, and disconcerting. But I had no pain in my heart or on the left side. My heart wasn’t racing. I took my pulse as best I could and thought it was normal. I decided to not go to the ER, but to sit up and monitor it. I couldn’t find my low-dose aspirin (though I had it with me). I found my Aleve, which is aspirin-like, and took one, thinking it couldn’t hurt and it might help.

As I sat there at the small desk in the hotel room, reading, monitoring my pain, it didn’t seem to be getting worse. At times, it seemed to be lessening. Then it might get a little worse for a brief time then less again. This went on for two hours. I drank some water, got up and walked around in the room, and prayed a lot, and messaged our kids to let them know what was going on and to be praying. I probably should have gone to the ER as a precaution, but didn’t.

Around 10 p.m. I moved from the desk chair to an easy chair and read there. I found myself dosing and fought it. The pain wasn’t changing much, but with each cycle of lessening and intensifying, the peaks seemed to become less intense. At some point I dosed off. I woke up around midnight, and the pain was almost gone. I decided the danger had passed and went to bed. Lynda had slept through all of this. I fell right asleep, I think, waking up around 4 or 5 a.m. and having no pain. Not a bit of residual pain. When morning came, it was as if nothing had happened.

We continued our drive home with no further episode. Of course, I called my cardiologist right away. Why do I have a cardiologist? Well, some years ago I learned I have a genetically different (should I say defective?) aortic valve. It is constructed differently from the standard heart valve. It functions fine, but it’s not as it should be, not as it is in most people. Back in 2017, my doctor ordered a carbon scoring test, which showed some build-up on the valve. But he retired, and the follow-up was lost. My current PCP was aghast that this hadn’t been followed up on and referred me to a cardiologist back in 2020. That cardiologist had some tests done, all of which showed my heart was fine. The report was written in what I call “medical-speak”, but at one point it broke out into plain English, saying “Strong Heart Muscle”.

They re-ran the tests after my latest incident, found the heart still strong, but some parts of it not getting enough oxygen. It was a change from the 2020 tests. The cardiologist decided to do a catheterization, see if I have a mostly blocked artery and, if needed, put in a stent. That happens Tuesday, tomorrow, at the hospital. If they find no blockage, I’ll get out that day. If they put in a stent, I’ll have to stay overnight.

When I posted something about this on Facebook last week, my cardiologist friend from high school and college called me. He said this was nothing to worry about. He’d done lots of them in his career, even had one done on him. I read to him the reports in medical-speak, and he said yes, I would probably get a stent. Easy-peasy. He also said my heart was in better shape than his.

That will mean I’ll be on restricted diet and movements for a few days. No driving. No walking. I’ve actually had to cut back on my walking. When I walk uphill (and you can’t leave our house without walking uphill), I get the pains in my throat/neck. When I walk on level ground or downhill, the pains go away. So obviously something is wrong. I’ll miss two writers’ meetings because of that, one on-line tomorrow, and one in person on Thursday. I regret that, but that’s how it must be.

So that’s where I am. I wish I were 20 or 30 pounds lighter going into this, but I love food too much and have lacked the discipline I need to lose more. Maybe after this I’ll be more careful.

So, I’ll report back to you on Friday with how it went, earlier on Facebook. That’s assuming I’m not that one person out of a thousand for whom the procedure doesn’t go well. My cardiologist friend said not to worry about those chances, that in his long career he had only three of these not go the way intended. I said good, but I’d rather the odds were 1 in 10,000.

Health

A Holiday Monday

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Oh wow, it’s Monday, and I didn’t have a blog post planned. Shame on me. It’s a holiday, and I just wasn’t thinking. I had my mind on something else. Today I had a 1:30 p.m. appointment for a heart stress test. This was a test postponed from January due to weather. Strange the hospital was open for routine appointments on a Federal holiday, but it was. I didn’t even think about it being a holiday when we rescheduled the appointment.

Then, about 10:30 a.m. this morning, they called me to ask if I could come in early, say right away. I suppose they had a cancellation and wanted to finish early. I thought about it for a few minutes, and decided to go. The type of tests took some time, and I was at the hospital three hours. After the tests were over, I went over to the lab to have blood drawn for the routine tests I have every quarter. Then, a stop at Five Guys for burgers and fries to take home.

Once home, I ate half of a burger, tried to read, and fell asleep on the living room floor. All this time, from when I was driving to the hospital to when I fell asleep on the floor, I knew I needed to have a blog post today. But here it is, late in the day, and I’m just now writing the post, a filler rather than a real post.

I’ll be back on Friday, hopefully with a proper post. That will be after two days of winter storms, if the current forecast holds.

Bible study, Christianity, Documenting America, Health, History, home improvements, reading, Sharon Williams short stories, Writing

Post Not Ready

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Six ads running for this, getting impressions, clicks, and a few sales. Other promotion is bearing fruit.

This morning I went outside to work shortly after I got up at 6:45 a.m. The temperature was 60°, and it felt good. I planned to work a half hour, mainly cleaning up a few things and pulling a few weeds from the backyard. When I did what I wanted and went inside, I was surprised to find I’d worked more than 45 minutes. I was way past scheduled time for my blog post, but I wasn’t worried about it since I had a post partially started—two posts actually—and thus could post it quickly once I got to it.

Alas, I finally came to my dashboard here, found there was only one post, and realized it is no where ready to be posted. Bad memory I have.

So here I am with nothing prepared to say. I could talk about any number of things off the cuff: what I’m writing, what I’m reading, how book sales are, what I’m doing for book sales promotion, life in general. I guess I could tackle all of those.

I’m still working on little changes to the church centennial book. I got some new information yesterday that will require a minor change. I also have decided to double-check a couple of places in the book. One I’m fairly sure will require a change, the other one maybe or maybe not. Still, I come closer to done on this every day.  Also, my short story inches along. Every couple of days I open the file, re-read it to remember where I was, and add a few hundred words. I need an uninterrupted , undistracted couple of hours to finish it.

For reading, my time is taken up with Way Truth Life, the book for our Life Group lessons. I’m also reading a book on the Genesis flood. Sorry, I don’t remember the exact title, except that it might be The Genesis Flood. It is a scholarly work from the late 50s-early 60s. I’m not enjoying it a whole lot, but will stay with it a while longer. As to recently finished books, I have four sitting here on my work table waiting for me to write my book reviews.

Book sales are good in September. So far I have 14 sales outright, and I think two accesses from Kindle Unlimited with both people finishing the book. This is my first time to have KU reads (not many of my books are in KU), and I need to figure how to account for them in my stats. I suppose as 2 sales, bringing the total to 16. That’s a good start to the month.

Sometime soon I’ll make a presentation to the local Civil War Roundtable. That will be my first author event since June 2019.

I have been a little more active in book promotion the last week. I still have my Amazon ads running for three books, and they seem to be generating sales. I contacted two influencers in our denomination, both men I’ve interacted with in the past, about giving a shout out to Acts Of Faith. I heard back from one on Friday and he is going to put a promo in his next newsletter.  Another promotional item concerns my Civil War book, Documenting America: The Civil War Edition. Back in July I gave a copy of it to the president of the local Civil War Roundtable. I heard back from him yesterday. He liked the book and wants me to make a presentation to the Roundtable. I don’t yet know when that will be, but should know today or tomorrow. So book promotion is in progress and, at least a little, seems to be working.

Life in general is good. I’m still having trouble losing weight, but in general my weight is dropping very slowly. My blood sugars have been under control, though just a little higher than I’d like. This morning’s was good. My right knee has been hurting more of late. Perhaps replacement surgery will have to be moved up. Although, the last three or four days I’ve done a few different things to try and ease the pain and it seems to be working. Four nights of good sleep in a row. Yardwork is in much better shape than in past years. Household projects are slowly being done. My devotional life remains consistent, with room for improvement.

Life goes on. I’ll have a better post on Friday, and will start getting some of these book reviews done.

America, Health, Politics

So Tired Of Covid Protocol Arguments

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“I’m not wearing a mask. I’m a free person and you can’t make me! The government can’t make me! I won’t be a sheep like you!”

“If you don’t wear a mask you are purposely killing people. Murderer!”

These are the two ends of the covid argument, and I’m sick of it. The rhetoric is way over the top on both sides. It’s the same for the vaccines, though, if anything, it’s even worse for the vaccines. People yelling past each other on each of these issues, not only on social media, but in real life as well.

I’m trying to ignore it as much as I can. I’m a reasonably intelligent person and don’t really feel like I need the government telling me what to do. They are a good data-gathering organization and, if they will just do that and make the aggregated data available and easy to find and understand, without hiding any data that might argue against some kind of prevailing wisdom. I can then make good decisions. I did that. I received a vaccine (J&J was the one being offered at the place where I went) and, since the resurgence in covid cases I’ve gone back to wearing a mask in public.

But the question I have is do people not know how to get what they want? It’s an old business adage: “Do you want to be right, or do you want to get what you want?” The idea behind this is sometimes you might be right and lose the argument or not get what you want. A hypothetical: You’re a Republican and want to put a campaign bumper sticker on your car. But you want to get business from a certain city and the mayor is a Democrat. So, to get what you want (more business and more profit) you don’t worry about being right (displaying a Republican bumper sticker). Don’t worry about being right; instead get what you want.

On social media, George Takei posted this:

Telling me you are proudly unvaccinated is like telling me you’re a drunk driver. You’re not a patriot. You’re not a freedom fighter. You’re a menace.

Does Takei really think this will convince people who have resisted getting the vaccine to now get it? Is this how you win arguments? I don’t think so. I suppose Takei feels pretty good about himself. In a witty way he called those who refuse the vaccine idiots. But he is, in fact, hurting his own cause. No one is going to decide to get the vaccine because George Takei calls them a menace. Because Takei speaks this way he will cause some who were on the fence to do the opposite of what he wants them to do. So I say to him, “George, learn how to get what you want rather than be right.”

I want to suggest an alternate approach. It’s the approach our church took. First, a little history. When the pandemic hit in March 2020, our church ended in-person services. Services went on-line. Sometime around June 2020, they began services in-person but continued on-line and did not encourage in-person attendance. The sanctuary that seats 600 was reconfigured to seat less than 100. Masks were required. Physical distancing was required. Life groups didn’t meet in person. Hand sanitizer was everywhere. Then, in September 2020, we increased seating in the sanctuary just a little. That’s when I went back to in-person church. Then, somewhere around Jan-Feb 2021, things opened up a little more. People started coming back in larger numbers. We still physically distanced, but masks were mostly done away with.

Then, somewhere around June 2021, covid cases began spiking in northwest Arkansas. A few people went back to wearing masks. A few vulnerable people went back to on-line church. In July the church re-instituted a protocol, a recommendation, to wear masks in any part of the church where you couldn’t distance from others. But this was all made voluntary with a request/strong suggestion that you do this. And, since that was re-instituted, we have had 100 percent compliance with these voluntary standards. 100 percent compliance. Maybe some who can’t wear masks or won’t wear masks decided to stay away or attend on-line.

Our pastor wrote a blog post about this. It’s worth reading.

An Open Letter To My Church

It’s a little long, but not so much. I hope you read it. Here’s the salient point in it.

I looked around the lobby this past Sunday and everyone was wearing masks, complying with the recommendation of our board. This happened not because you were forced, but because you believed the wellbeing of your neighbor was more important than your personal comfort or freedom.

My point is that beating up people, insulting people, shaming people, to convince them to wear a mask in public, be vaccinated against covid, or practice physical distancing won’t work. It won’t. But giving them information and explaining to them what you think is right, what you hope they will do and want them to do, for their own good and for the good of the community, will result in people doing what you want—to a much larger extent than shaming/insulting/belittling.

Health, home improvements, miscellaneous

Still Tired

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One friend I exchange letters with, via e-mail, said, “You really don’t understand retirement”, or something close to that. As I said in Monday’s post, I stay busy. So I guess my friend is right.

This week, every morning, I’ve been out in the yard around 6:30 a.m. to do my work before the heat of the day comes. I’m pulling weeds from a couple of places. Also, Mon-Tues-Wed I cut the deadwood from our crepe myrtle bush. The branches all died in last winter’s extreme cold, but new shoots are coming up. The dead branches took a lot of sawing, so I spread that hard work out over three days. But it’s done. Tomorrow, I have just a little more weed pulling left, then bush trimming (evergreen and boxwoods), which I should be able to do in an hour or so. Then I’ll haul the cuttings and the deadwood off to the brush piles I’ve made in the woods nearby. Then, next week, I can tackle the backyard.

All this has left me pretty tired. You would think that an hour of yardwork a day wouldn’t tucker me out, but it seems to. That’s a lot of bending and stooping. A rock yard should be easier to keep up than a grass yard, right? Maybe if you spray for weeds regularly to keep them from growing, but pulling them out by hand is real work. Hopefully it’s keeping me young.

Wait, if I can’t work an hour in the yard without wanting to rest the rest of the day, I am no longer young. I keep telling myself that there’s nothing wrong with me that losing another 40 pounds (on top of the 80 already lost) won’t cure, but maybe that’s not true. I haven’t felt much like walking lately, though maybe that’s the heat more than energy. Walking seems to give me energy. Maybe I am old.

The fatigue I’ve felt has slopped over to non-physical pursuits. My work on the history book for the church anniversary is close to done. I’ve started the process of looking into printing options. I should now be spending time on my next two writing projects. But, after a brief rest after yardwork, I haven’t felt like new writing. I do a little hole-plugging on the church book, bringing it from 98% done to 99.5% done, but my mind hasn’t wanted to wrap around my work.

I did manage one mental task this morning. I finally called an appliance repair man to come and see about our oven. The lower heating element went out a couple of months ago. The porkchop and rice casserole I made last night took three hours to cook, so I’d had enough. The man is to come out late today or sometime tomorrow.

So that’s something. Next, maybe I’ll get our barely functioning vacuum cleaner replaced. After that, maybe I’ll return to decluttering activities. Or maybe I’ll get two listings made today, if I can multi-task these house and home items.

Then, and only then, will I have mental energy to work on my writing.

Oh, yes, one more thing. I have decided that next year I will hire a “lawn” service to spray for weeds in the front yard. If that works well and there’s no weed pulling to do, maybe the year after next I’ll do the same for the back yard. That will be my nod to retirement and the accumulating years.

family, Health

Thoughts You Don’t Want To Think

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[Dateline: 8 July 2021, 8 a.m.]

This post will go live tomorrow, at 7:30 a.m. I write it now and schedule it because I will be quite busy at that time. Actually, I will be in a hospital waiting room at that time as Lynda will be undergoing a heart ablation. We have to be at the hospital, about a 45 minute drive, at 5:30 a.m. We haven’t had such an early wake-up and departure in a long time, our recent trip to Chicago excepted.

Lynda’s heart first went into a-fib in the fall of 2019. She began seeing a cardiologist at that time. They scheduled some kind of procedure (maybe a heart inversion), but when she got to the hospital her heart was in normal rhythm, so they canceled it. Since then they’ve been watching it, having Lynda take her blood pressure and being careful with her activity. Her heartbeat has sometimes dropped to 45. When she was in the hospital in April 2020 for her appendix, she went into a-fib and they had to treat it.

Fortunately, she has great awareness of when she goes into a-fib. It happened on the drive home from Chicago on Monday, but lasted only a short time. With a new medication, she hasn’t had those really slow heart rate.

The “ablation”—and I don’t know how I got that name—seems to me to be an odd procedure. The put electrodes through the groin up a vein and zap the vessels adjacent to the heart (arteries or veins, I’m not sure which) with electricity. The goal is to cause scar tissue to build up on the vessels, and supposedly the scar tissue will prevent the heart from going into a-fib. How that will prevent a-fib is a mystery to me. And who first thought of it to begin with?

It is also possible that they will decide instead (or maybe both) to install a pacemaker in her. That decision will be made during the procedure. They say this will be a 3 or 4 hour procedure.

I’ll be in the waiting area. Since Arkansas is now having a surge in covid cases, mainly the delta variation, I don’t know where exactly I will be. Plus this is a new hospital for us to go to. I don’t know if they will let me be in the room where they prep her, then with her in recovery after, or if I’ll be kept out away from her. While this is a procedure which might result in her going home the same day, it’s also possible she will be kept overnight or even two days. Given her general weakness right now, I suspect they will keep her at least one night.

They say this procedure, the ablation, works 95% of the time. I think that’s what they told us. Such odds don’t sound to good to me. Which got me to thinking thoughts I don’t really want to think. You know what I mean. What if it doesn’t solve the a-fib problem? What if her body isn’t strong enough to come through the procedure? What if——. Thoughts you don’t want to think. Fortunately, I have access to God through prayer, and an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ. While I’ll have reading material with me tomorrow, I suspect I’ll be praying more than reading.

If you read this shortly after it’s posted, please say a prayer for Lynda, as she will be in the midst of the procedure. If you read this later in the day on Friday, say a prayer, as she will be in recovery. If you read it anytime later, say a prayer for success of the procedure and her return to something closer to a normal life, being able to be active again.

Health, miscellaneous, reading, Writing

A Mixture of Things

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I’m now down to about 125 of Mom’s old books left, from around the 800 I started with. That doesn’t include the 100 or so that I’m keeping and are on display in the house.

This week has been just that: a mixture of things, getting done, adding to the to do list, and either worrying over or brushing aside.

First and foremost was completing our income taxes for 2020. The deadline was changed this year from April 15 to May 17, and since I knew I was going to have to pay (based on my early estimates) I embraced the new deadline and delayed my personal tax work. I did our trading partnership taxes and got them in by March 15, the deadline for partnership filing. I completed them Tuesday, let them sit overnight, found an error Wednesday, re-printed them, let them sit overnight, proofed them Thursday morning and declared them good, signed them, wrote a check, got them in an envelope, and walked them to the P.O. Done for another year.

No, not quite done. Every year, when I finish the taxes, I say I’m going to prepare my spreadsheets for the following tax season. Obviously, the Federal and State forms might change next year, which would necessitate a change in my spreadsheets, but I can’t anticipate those changes. I can at least create the 2021 Taxes folder and save this year’s spreadsheets into it, change all the date, zero-out the manual entries,  and have them ready. Also, I have my “Estimated taxes” tab to help me know if I have to send in any payments during the year. I got that prepared and entries made through yesterday. Also, I created my 2021 writing business spreadsheet, overhauled it somewhat to remove some clunkiness, and made all entries year to date. So, I feel pretty good about this.

This photo didn’t come out as well as I hoped. The left side of the street is lined with blackberry bushes awash with while blooms. I’ll be doing a lot of picking in late June and July.

Speaking of writing business issues, I sold four books yesterday. I buyer was coming to get some of my older books that I have listed for sale on Facebook Marketplace—23 of them to be precise. I took the occasion to message her that I was an author, gave her the link to my author page at Amazon, and she said she would get some. Some turned out to be four. That gives me eight sales for the month. And, yes, these are some of the things I entered in my 2021 writing business spreadsheet.

A local writing group I’m a member of, Bella Vista Village Lake Writers and Poets, met in person Wednesday for the first time since February 2020. It was a planning meeting, outdoors at a Starbucks. Only five of us met, but it was good to do so.

Work continues on my writing projects. I get a little done on the church anniversary book almost every day. Same thing with the Bible study I’m working on. This week I’ve had a break-through, of sorts, on how to do one difficult section. The Bible isn’t particularly difficult to understand at this point, but how to present the material a interesting and informative way was a question for me. I figured it out, I think, and will soon move forward with it. Also, my next short story in the Sharon Williams Fonseca series is starting to roll around inside my head. I think, when I get done with the projects I’m currently working on, I’ll be ready to write that.

Other than selling those books, our decluttering/disaccumulation efforts have slowed. Over the last month we’ve finished four small books that are not keepers. Once I get the book reviews done for this blog, off to the sale/giveaway shelves they will go.

After a two week hiatus from walking, I’m back at it. It started with short walks in the evenings with Lynda, just as much as she has strength to do. Tuesday I think we did just under half a mile, Wednesday two-thirds, and yesterday nine-tenths. Also yesterday I did my afternoon walk to the P.O. and, along with some extra trips down side streets, I did a little over two miles on that walk. How great that was. My walking shoes are almost worn out and I’ll soon need to get another pair, but the ones I have are doing alright for now.

My main observation during my walks was the blackberry blooms. The bushes are covered with them, and the number of bushes with blooms is more than ever. On our street, I tend these bushes. It’s not much work. I cut away various woody plants that compete with them for sunshine; I cut vines that grow up and choke the blackberries, and I cut away dead branches from prior years, giving the new branches a chance to grow. It seems to be working, because our street is loaded with bushes. I’ll be making cobblers and muffins and who-knows-what all July and into August, with some to freeze.

Local lore says that you need some cooler temperatures to cause the blackberries to “set” properly. Most Mays we get those cooler temperatures, and the time is called “Blackberry Winter”. Well, last week and this week we had that. We are past the frost-free date, but temperatures dropped into the 40s for the about six of the last ten nights, with the highs getting above 70 only once or twice. This morning it was 46 when I got up. We had this both before the blackberry bushes bloomed and after. This, I hope, will result in a good crop.

And, last among my miscellaneous activities, is reading. I mentioned the small books above that we’ve already read. We started on another one a couple of days ago, a non-scholarly commentary on the book of Daniel. It’s going well so far. I’m also reading in the Annals of America as research for my next Documenting America volume. Also in a very thick book on the history of the Jewish people. I don’t get a lot of pages done each day, but I’m making a little progress. I may pull off this and read the last 50 pages of a book I can get rid in less time. Also, I have volume 3 of The Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis for Kindle, and have been reading that on my phone whenever I have a spare ten minutes with nothing to do. So far I’m a 135 pages in on this 1600 page book. It’s probably the most enjoyable of all that I’m reading.

This post is longer than I expected, but I haven’t time to make it shorter. See you all on Monday.

Health, home improvements, miscellaneous, The Teachings

Getting Things Done – Latest Edition

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Thursday’s work was stump grinding from our front yard. Looks like they did a good job.

More than once I’ve posted about getting things done. I usually keep a to-do list, which I try to work through. From time to time I slack off from the list, but somehow that doesn’t reduce the amount of things needing to get done. I’m a little late with my post this morning because of getting things done. In fact, it’s likely to take me over an hour to write and post this because I still have other things to get done that are on a time schedule.

Today’s work is pressure washing the north wall and some other minor repairs. It’s going well. Just wish they had brought their long ladder.

How far back do I go? For over a year my wife has asked me to have her sewing machine looked at, but pandemic related closings and restrictions caused me to keep putting this off. Plus, the repair shop is 18 miles away, and I don’t generally drive 18 miles for a single purpose trip. But Wednesday of last week I was in Rogers for something else and could divert to the store with very little distance added. I did so and dropped the machine off. When there, they said they needed a bobbin for the machine and there was none in it. Once home I got the bobbin ready to mail. But when I took it to the P.O. I learned it was too thick to be considered a letter and would cost $4 to mail as a small parcel. I knew I would be in Rogers again this week, so I just made the slight diversion again and dropped that at the sewing shop. Now we wait for the repairs. Check off the item on the to-do list.

It’s a little hard to see in this photo, but the area to the right is weeded; to the left is not. I think this work is keeping me young and agile. At least a little more so.

Last Saturday I received a message about someone wanting to buy some of my wife’s paperback romance novels I had listed on Facebook Market place. The problem was she lived too far away to come by and get them, would I ship them and how much would it cost? I replied immediately and transitioned into salesman mode. I told her yes, I would ship them, but had many more available that weren’t mentioned in the Marketplace listing. I’ll shorten this story. We had 203 romances to sell and she wanted them all. I took them to the P.O. on Monday to weight for a shipping estimate, received payment via PayPal on Tuesday, and took the books to the P.O. in the mini-snowstorm the same day. They are now in USPS hands, “winging” their way to her. Check one item off the to-do list.

Also P.O. related, on Monday I mailed a nice group of greeting cards to the daughter of a first cousin. These are cards found in my dad’s house at his death in 1997. He kept all incoming greeting cards, and even had some that went to his father. I’ve slowly gone through them and sent them back to the families from whence they came. I contacted this cousin and she would like the cards from her grandfather, mother, and aunt. Mailed them on Monday; check one item off the to-do list.

On Tuesday, while waiting at the doctor’s office, I finally called our electrical cooperative to ask why they had never come back to grind the stumps left from when they took trees out of my front yard in December 2019 and January 2020. A different crew was supposed to come a few days after the last tree was down, but they never did. I kept finding the card for the vegetation management guy, then losing it, then finding it. The last time I found it I put it where I could pick it up easily, did so as I went out to the doc. The co-op was very apologetic, the man came out that day, and the crew arrived Thursday late-morning to do the work. They were done by 1:30 p.m., and the yard looks good. Check another item off the to-do list.

Everything above in this post I wrote over two hours ago, almost three.  I interrupted first for doing my stock market work, which is busy on Friday. Then the work crew came that is doing some siding maintenance and repair on our metal siding. Spending our stimulus money. Since I was outside lining them out, I did my yardwork, a little more than usual. Now, I’m back in The Dungeon, typing away.

I have two books to work on, but haven’t done much this week other than research, as these other tasks distracted me too much. But, really, there was one big task that was the most distracting: publishing The Teachings. Sunday (or maybe it was Monday; the days are running together) I published the e-book. I haven’t made an announcement as I wanted to get the print book published then start promoting it. But, the cover designer, who did a super job on the e-book cover, is busy with her college work and is a little delayed. That’s no fault on her; sometimes the timing of a project isn’t good.

Not bad as a placeholder. Just waiting on Amazon’s human review. It already passed the automatic review.

I decided I would try to pull it together, using the e-book cover and using G.I.M.P. Readers of this blog know that I hate G.I.M.P. Yesterday morning I decided I would just knuckle down and get it done, and I did. Today I uploaded the interior file and the cover. Amazon accepted them for human review without any problems—meaning I must have figured out the mechanics of using G.I.M.P. for creating print covers—and now I wait. My cover is a placeholder. When the cover designer’s schedule frees-up, I’ll have her do the real one. Meanwhile, the book will be available both as an e-book and print book.

So here it is, 12:17 p.m., and I’m finally coming to the end of this post. Maybe next week will have fewer things on the to-do-list. You think?

Health

These Are The Days of Covid-19

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Surprise, surprise! We’re covid-19 positive. 🙁 Not fun.

In a day or two I’ll draft our Christmas letter. I plan on starting it, “What a year, what a year!”

Yes, it has been a doozy of a year. What with the corona virus pandemic hitting, then Lynda’s appendix bursting putting her into the hospital for 19 days with two major operations at the height of the spring restrictions, then her blacking out and falling in August and an ER visit followed by seeing cardiologists about whether her heart caused her to black out. Yes, what a year.

So what do you do when in isolation because you’re covid-19 positive? Put up some Christmas decorations.

It is now worse, however. On Tuesday, Lynda and I both tested positive for covid-19. What a shock. We had both been a little under the weather with what seemed like common colds. Mine fairly mild, Lynda’s a little deeper. Her cold began Dec 1 (maybe the evening of Nov 30), mine Dec 3. Since our son is planning to visit us from the 12th to the 21st, and since any sickness in these times gets you nervous, we decided to get tested. Expecting this to be a simple, calming precaution, what a shock it was when the medical person said, just 10 minutes after the tests, “Well, you are both positive.”

Or you read in sunroom and watch the Christmas cacti start to bloom.

Obviously we are now isolated until we are no longer contagious. I don’t know how long that will be. As to symptoms, mine are very, very mild. I have no fever, didn’t have a fever. I had sniffles and a slight sore throat resulting in a cough. I also had pressure behind my eyes causing them to be very tired and…weird. In other words, exactly like my many colds over the years. Lynda had the same, but also muscle aches and a severe headache. She ran a temperature of 100-101 for a couple of days.

We were barely home from the tests Tuesday afternoon when our doctor called. She had us each describe our symptoms and how they had changed from onset to present. She didn’t ask anything about where we might have got it. The people at the clinic didn’t ask us that either.

Or, you go through yet another box of old letters: collating them, indexing them, and preparing to transcribe them.

Already, my symptoms are mostly gone and Lynda’s are much reduced. I’m back to normal and Lynda is close to back to normal. Yesterday I walked to the PO (mailing stuff outside) and today almost as far. Together we walked a slow half-mile each of the last two days. Our son ordered a pulse-ox meter for us. It arrived today and we began taking our oxygen level at rest and after six minutes of light exercise, as the doctor asked us to do. So far, so good. We are both at 96% O2 both at rest and after exercise. We’ll watch this closely for a week or so, doing the double readings three times a day, then see where we are.

And, of course, you read in your Advent devotional book every day.

As I understand the disease, the fact that we are both feeling better doesn’t mean we are recovered. Symptoms can come and go. After being better for a while, giving you a false sense of return to health, it can get worse. The worst doesn’t necessarily come when expected.

We are scratching our heads trying to figure out how we got it. Lynda’s symptoms began on Nov 30/Dec 1 and mine not until Dec 3 suggests she got it before me. But I could have been asymptomatic and got it first. Looking 14 days before that, we had a couple of outings but in a safe manner. We were outside in downtown Bentonville on Nov 19, walking around. Lynda went in a restaurant to use the restroom, and into another store out of curiosity, both times wearing a mask. Most people we encountered were wearing masks, even out in the open. I went to church on Nov 22 and made a trip to Wal-Mart on Nov 25. At both places masks are the norm. No one at church was without one, and at WM maybe 5 percent of the customers didn’t wear masks. Contagion not impossible, but maybe improbable.

I’ll give an update once I know anything more. For now, we continue our isolated state, but totally now instead of mostly.

Health, reading

Clarity of Mind

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How to re-engage the brain, short of taking questionable supplements?

I’m running late today with this post. I had time to do it early this morning (thought in fact I slept in a bit, not getting up till 6:45 a.m.), but let other things fill up the time—good things, but they caused the delay. I normally try to have my blog post up by 7:30 a.m.

I think just about everyone who does intellectual or creative activities finds themselves in times when their mind just won’t engage sufficiently to produce anything. I know that true for me. One activity that’s true for is when I read aloud to my wife in the evenings. For about three or four months we’ve read a mix of Agatha Christie novels, Bible studies, devotional books, just about anything. I do most of the reading but Lynda does some. When I read, I can tell right away if my mind is not engaged. I’ll read the words out loud but won’t comprehend what I’m reading. At some point I’ll come to a name or situation that stands out and wonder where it came from, only to go back a few paragraphs and realize I read right through it without comprehending.

Other times, my mind is so clear and so well engaged that reading is easy, comprehension is good, and the only need to go back is if I think the author has made a mistake (the curse of being a writer who reads). Right now, for instance, my mind is quite well engaged. I’ve been looking at another author’s websites and books for sale in preparation of interviewing her for a post here.

It’s not just with reading that I’ve noted the engaged or disengaged mind phenomenon. It happens with writing. Sometimes I pull up my work in progress on the computer and can’t see my way clear to write a word; other times the words just flow out. It’s not writer’s block. It’s not that I can’t think of something to write, it’s that my mind just won’t work. Sometimes it’s tiredness. Sometimes it’s clutter. Sometimes it’s overload resulting in the wheels of thought not being able to turn.

Written during the 2012 election, this book had relevance in 2020. I will soon being reviewing it on this blog, probably in two posts.

Of late I’ve had trouble engaging my mind in two particular books. One is Miracles by C.S. Lewis. The other is Kings and Presidents by Tim and Shawna Gaines [my review now posted]. I’m reading Lewis for pleasure and elucidation. I’ve been reading the Gaines for teaching the book in adult Life Group. I could easily set Lewis aside until my mind felt more lucid, but I had to read K&P because of the teaching schedule. But I struggled with it, mightily struggled. How much of that was the subject matter, how much was mind disengagement I have no idea. I suppose it also could have been the writing style. But for whatever reason, my ability to apply my mind and grasp what the authors were trying to tell me was lacking, even when I read the chapters three times.

Go back now to last Tuesday. We watched television rather than read aloud. We went to bed at the normal time (11 p.m. or a little later). Normally I fall asleep quickly, but not that night. I tossed and turned, not in pain, but in some kind of agitation. And perhaps a brain that wouldn’t stop churning. I got up around 12:45 a.m. My wife was in the same category. She got up and together we went to our reading chairs. I said, “I think I’ll read in the book for Life Group lessons; that will put me to sleep right away.”

Except it didn’t. I opened to the chapter I was to teach five days later and found I was comprehending it! The author’s words popped out at me. The concepts they stated, the solutions they proposes, the problems they solved, all of these stood out. An hour and a half later I had a good comprehension and knew how I would teach the class.

What caused this? Was it something I ate that gave me an engaged mind and excellent comprehension in the middle of the night after having days of a disengaged mind? Was it simply that the impact of getting many tasks done had built up to some milestone in my busyness in life in general that my mind was free to concentrate? I wish I knew.

In the days between Tuesday and Sunday I was able to reread other portions of the book with great comprehension. I was able to read in the evenings without excessive tiredness and lack of engagement. This status lasted for six days in a row. It remains still, now for a seventh day.

As I said before, I wish I knew what the change was. For sure I like myself better this way.