Bye Bye Pine Tree

After posting the first of two today, I went to the bathroom and was looking out the window as the wind was literally shaking the house. One of the few remaining pine trees in the yard was doubled over and I thought that it would surely go down with the next gust.

I was not disappointed.

Medical Update 23 March 2011

For those of you who haven't heard, I am still alive and kicking.

During December 2009, I had surgery to repair two aneurysms, one behind my left knee and one on my left femoral artery. After surgery I developed an infection on the incision. Treatment at the hospital was ineffective and I was discharged to return home but I had to undergo intravenous antibiotic/antiviral treatment for bout a month and a half before the infection finally cleared up. Nearing the end of the regimen, I developed a severe rash as a reaction to the increased dosage the doctor asked me to go to. When the rash bloomed, I immediately stopped all treatment and the infection cleared up immediately afterwards. I did, and still do, have to treat the rash on about a monthly basis with a cream. My personal physician says I will need to do this for the rest of my life.

Then in May 2010, I returned to the Clinic and had surgery to repair an aneurysm behind my right knee and another one on my right femoral artery. At the same time the surgeon did the necessary work at the right femoral site to enable him to perform the required surgery on my upper aortic aneurysm whenever it become large enough to repair.

He will not do this work until then because there are some potential complications that he feels outweigh the need for sped in repairing it. These potentials carry the possibility of paralyzation .

After going back for the nine month checkup (you need to understand there was a three month checkup also), the doctor says there was almost no growth in the aneurysm over the past six months, and I was released until February or March of 2012.

So, thanks for your good wishes. I appreciate them very much.

A Year and Five Months

Seventeen months?

Holy cow!

That's a long time to go without posting anything to a blog.

But too much has happened to attempt to recall all of them.

This morning started off at about 65 degrees and has gone up to about 71degrees and now the cold front is passing through and it it dropping like a rock. Supposed to be about 42 or 43 overnight.

Winds are kicking up pretty good. They are saying the wind might hit 60 mph or higher.

We have been looking into getting new fireplaces for the old homestead. A crack developed in the big one i the bedroom, along a line about eighteen inches long. The chimney sweep says the unit is unusable as is. So we want to replace it.

At the same time, we plan to put a fireplace in the living room.

We have it out for bids right now. Gonna be spensive.

We have removed everything from the junk room and have removed the carpet and tack strips. This is the first step in combining that room into the kitchen area. The carpet will be laid on the back porch. We're also looking into getting windows/doors to glass in the back porch--one of the benefit of the newer fireplaces is that the two will heat the entire house including a glassed in back porch, so we can add that 400-500 square feet to the usable living space, bringing us up to about 3100.

It will take two 48" windows for each side, and two 36" for the front plus a 6' French door for the front. Once that is done, then we can put the two French doors from the combined kitchen/spare room combination out onto the porch. And getting the electrician out to move the meterbox out to the end of the house and alter some of the interior wiring for the kitchen. Then comes the plumber to move the sink and do some minor work underneath the house.

Of course you know that will all not happen in just one year. Or even a year and five months.

Uh oh!! Lightning and thunder getting pretty bad.

Later, Tater!!!!!!!!!!