Week Forty-Four

Here we are, in the waning days of April.  The days are getting longer, the temperature is warmer, the veggies are all planted, the flannel sheets are stored. Summer is around the bend, to be followed rapidly by fall, and soon it’s time for Christmas decorations.  Life is whizzing by.

This blog is nearly a year old…I suppose I can keep it up till week Fifty-two…and then I’ll probably bid a fond adieu.

So what has happened this past week?  My weight, which got up over 130 for about four days, has slipped back to 128ish.  I’ve been a bit more active…trips to the gym, walks in the morning, occasional golf in the afternoon.  I’m burning up more calories, and now, somehow, I’ve got to eat even more food.  A very tall order.

I did my best yesterday…Carol and I dined with old USF friends Don and Ruthie at a dim sum joint, and we stuffed ourselves…bows and wraps and dumplings and this and that, and then a whole roasted duck!  I was afraid to even burp.  And we’ll be having a little left-over roast duck for lunch today.

We saw the doctor about sleep apnea this week, and he is referring me to the ‘sleep study’ department of the clinic. I’ve also got to look into remedies to ease the unpleasantness of the stomach contents ‘creep’ into my shortened esophagus during the night.  More than once this past week I’ve awakened with terrible taste from stomach acids getting high into my throat.  I don’t know that it is due to excessive acid buildup in my stomach.  It may just be normal acids, but with no ‘gate’ between the stomach and esophagus, the acids just drift into the esophagus if my head slips below the level of my stomach.  A solution to this is high on the list, including a mechanical bed.

Last night I had another of those weird visions.  Two hanging indistinct objects, about an inch wide and maybe three feet long were out in front of me. I reached out several times to grasp them, but nothing was there.  At the time I was quite sure I was awake.  I’m not so sure now.

We got Andrew and Mel off to the San Francisco airport Wednesday night for their long, long flight to Australia.  They will be gone for six weeks.  The house will be much quieter with them gone, but we will miss them, and look forward to their return.

We talk to the prostate biopsy doctor at UCSF via telephone consult on Monday and then my urologist in Sacramento sometime after that.  She set up an appointment with me the week after next, but I’ll be in the desert on an annual golf outing, so will have to reschedule the second urologist chat.  After these consults I’ll know what I’m facing regarding next steps.  Either there’s been no real change, and I can continue with ‘active surveillance’ or the cancer has grown and I have to take some action, i.e. radiation or surgery.

So that’s about all the news from here.  I’ll close with a poem written last year shortly after we bought a brand new 2017 Subaru Outback.

 

(Untitled)  A 2017 Lenten writing

Over the years they have started to show

An ache, a pain, but they came along slow.

 

Sixty was great, like a frisky old kid

When seventy came, a little bit slid.

 

The aches and the pains at seventy-five

Are telling me that I’ve been long alive.

 

The end is out there, somewhere down the road

And, indirectly, that’s what I was told…

 

When I bought a new car not long ago

The salesman closed by saying ‘you know…

 

‘This vehicle’s solid, and it can fly

It’s likely the last one you’ll have to buy.’

 

Well, thank you, I guess, for what you just said

To know I can drive it, until I am dead.