Lesa's Book Critiques: Kevin’s Corner Annex – Throwing Shadows by Claire Booth

 Lesa's Book Critiques: Kevin’s Corner Annex – Throwing Shadows by Claire Booth

EYE DOC VISIT

We are home and the dilation has worn off enough that I can see a little bit to post this. Working email or poking around online is going to have to wait until things are way better.

Scott is absolutely fine with only a very slight change needed on his prescription.

It has been seven years since I was in for a check and it seems that everything is fine. Yes, my eyes have changed significantly and I need new glasses. In fact, I will now need two different pairs. One for driving as seeing distance has become an increasing issue. So much so I have quit driving on any freeway as I just can’t see far enough down the road to feel safe at highway speeds. I will also have a second pair for reading and on the computer. They will be set up to be bifocals and should help.

More importantly, despite my terror, there is no sign of any macular degeneration at all. No glaucoma, no cataracts, no anything. In my left eye there has always been a large vein wrapped around the optic nerve from front to back. It is something that has to be watched as it could rupture and cause a massive stroke. It has not changed at all.

The Doctor spent considerable time evaluating both of my worries today as well as comparing the retinal photographs from 2012 and today. There is no change at all.

I can’t tell you how relieved I am about that.

So, good news all around. Next up on this, we should have our new glasses in about two weeks.

I am hoping to be able to see well enough today to be online and working on my email, but there is a more than decent chance I won’t be able to. I want to thank one and all for their good thoughts and prayers on my behalf as I was nervous wreck.

The View From The Backyard

The front that was supposed to be through our area of NE Dallas by mid morning, was way behind which allowed us to be outside reading until late afternoon. I played with the cellphone camera a little bit as you can see below.

Not sure you can see it, but we have green grass now and the trees are budding out.

Today With The Tipples

Sandi loved Valentine's Day and it is a deal I always hated as I thought of it as a made up BS holiday. My hatred of it and her love of it became a thing each year as she tried to talk me into doing whatever she wanted to do. It was a sort of running joke, but I now realize that it probably upset her more than she ever let on.

I would give anything to be able to go back and fix that as, like many other deals she was into and I was not, this day has been hard. Far harder than last year and I can only conclude that here in year two the shock of her being gone has worn off quite a bit. It did not help that for some reason Cher's song about turning back time, another song she and I both liked though she liked way more, has been stuck in my head since I woke up with it this morning. 

Here in our part of Ne Dallas it was super warm today as we headed up towards 80 with winds out of the Southwest. Not only is that a warming wind here year around, it also signals something is headed this way. One knows this time of year to get outside while one can, as the break from cloudy skies and lower temps will be a short one.

Scott and I spent much of the afternoon outside with both of us reading. An enjoyable and quiet afternoon led into my decision to cook steaks and potatoes out on the grill this afternoon. Because it was so nice we ended up eating dinner outside.  

With a cold front on the way that is supposed to hit sometime tomorrow last I heard, I doubt we will be doing much more of this sort of thing anytime soon. It was nice while it lasted. Doing so got me outside and out of the prison of my own mind for a bit and that was/is a good thing.

Working From Home While Wearing Pants

There is a bit of a running joke on Facebook about working from home and wearing pants. Whether or not one needs to even wear pants at home. Should there be a special pair of pants set aside by the front door somewhere in order to answer the door? It is one of those things that is funny if you see it and yet so hard to explain to those who have not.

Anyway, both Scott and I were definitely working from home and wearing pants today.  While I can't prove my this picture that I was wearing pants, they were on.

However, I can prove Scott was wearing pants by the picture below. I can also prove that he can multi task with the best of them. Not only is he taking notes on a book he is reading for one of his grad courses where he has to write a paper on said book, he also is managing to check his Facebook status on his cellphone at the same time.

Grandbaby Visit!

Yesterday Karl and Amy brought Jacob Ryan over for a visit. While this was his second visit, this was the first time we were able to hold him. Pictures below....

 

Crafty Lady Sandi: Life in the New Year

Crafty Lady Sandi: Life in the New Year: Hi! Crafters! Sorry the last blog was the 15th. I had set the blog up ahead of time; so, that is why there was blogs. Hopefully, it...

Porch Time

I'm not a fan of Daylight Savings Time, but it is nice to be able to sit outside for awhile after dinner. Taken by Karl earlier this evening.......

 

Wounded Feet

This has been a tough couple of days for the feet around here. Late yesterday evening, I stepped on a piece of glass that mysteriously appeared in the carpet. Cut an inch long gash in the bottom of my right foot and proceeded to bleed like crazy. Apparently the aspirin therapy in conjunction with my bp meds must be really working because you would have thought I slit my jugular the way the blood was coming out of me.No need for stitches and no need for a crime scene tech despite my bloody footprints everywhere around here while trying to find a bandaid..or two..or three.

Then today, Sandi got hung up in the umbilical cord from her air machine, stumbled, and then managed to kick the ottoman breaking her left little toe. She has unhappily broken it before--several times--and knew exactly what she had done when she did it. After she iced it down for a couple of hours, we got it immobilized and taped up. The ottoman would not have been there in front of her chair if she didn't need her feet up to try and reduce the daily swelling in her lower legs and ankles.

So, the feet have not been making out too well. Told the boys they better be real careful as this kind of crap runs in threes.

28 Years and Counting....

On a very warm afternoon of June 15, 1985 I married a certain young lady by the name of Sandi in a small church in a suburb of Boston. We were married in the same church her parents were married in years before. I wore a rented tux that was way too big in the waist. A highlight of the ceremony was that every time I moved, especially to kneel, a pin would fly free.

There were times when you literally could hear a pin hit something.

Soon, people in the first couple of rows learned to duck every time I knelt. As the ceremony wound down and I tried to not sound like a quivering idiot every time I spoke, little did we know that we were minutes away from taking a ride in a limo with  no air conditioning driven by a man who would run at least three red lights and nearly sideswipe a half a dozen cars in his attempt to get us to the reception hall. We had no idea it was really possible to make a limo go sideways through an intersection when one was not on a movie set.

It is. The driver did it twice. The second time he did it, he pulled off the hat trick by sending us both off the seat and to the floor.

We also didn't know that the next morning we would wake up to 28 degrees and snow and sleet falling on the city of Boston, Massachusetts. If we had, we might have had more clothing packed than lightweight shorts and shirts and a couple of pairs of jeans.

When we said our vows 28 years ago we had no idea that it was going to be, for the most part, a lot of whole lot of poorer and way too much sickness. We had no idea. What we thought our lives together would be like was very far from the reality that our lives have become. Especially since March of 2010 when I got sick with whatever this is I have and then Sandi's cardiac issues, strokes, and cancer battles. This was not the reality we had planned for and expected on any level.

But, life is what it is and while I would change a lot of things in my past, I would not change marrying Sandi. And I am very thankful and grateful that she is still here with me 28 years and counting later.

Happy Anniversary, Sandi.

A new review of MIND SLICES-----WELCOME TO HELL ~ by Glenn Walker: Mind Slices by Kevin R. Tipple

This has been a tough day. I fell a couple of times during the night last night trying to go to the bathroom as well as twice more today. I'm banged up pretty good and hurting, but nothing is broken.

Got notified today by Social Security that, somehow, we do not qualify for any assistance for a Medicare drug plan for me. Needless to say, we shall appeal this.

I then went out, because I had to go get Scott from UTD, and found a large screw in my right rear tire. Went to the repair place we use and they could patch it. That was followed by the information that I need all four of the tires on my car replaced asap because they are weather cracking and very unsafe. The cost---$550 and change. Pretty much takes my entire disability payment for a month.

While at the repair place I ran into somebody I used to work with just a few years ago. Not only could I not remember her name, I could barely remember working with her or anything about her family. This is somebody I worked with for months on end over several years while I was a substitute and yet I was sitting there like some kind of idiot and could not remember much of anything.

So, it has not been a fun day. I know it is nothing compared to what those in the northeast have gone through, but in my little part of the world, it has been very hard.

And then, on the flip side of everything, I find this tonight. I am just stunned by this review......

WELCOME TO HELL ~ by Glenn Walker: Mind Slices by Kevin R. Tipple: Kevin R. Tipple is a dear friend, or at least as good a friend as one can have online. That said, he's a good man, a great book reviewer...