Bright day

12/21/06 Thursday
It’s a bright morning. Caught this picture of the sunrise. It’s not as spectacular as some but I seldom get to take a picture of one, in fact I may never have. The sunsets I have been better at getting.

I was sharp this morning, with Cherie laughing and enjoying each other. Lately I’ve been making fun of the “Enzite” commercials where some guy runs around with this frozen smile on his face. I should have been a comedian cause I am always putting on a show. Of course it’s easier when my audience is Cherie and putting a smile on her face is one of the biggest joys of my life.

I rushed to start this journal as I detected the precursors of a seizure. I am getting better at recognizing them. I remember that Mark Sherry, the director of disability studies at the University of Toledo who is a brain injury survivor, has a dog that is trained to warn him when a seizure is coming. It can tell when these are coming. Maybe by detecting sweat, skin temperature rise, or who knows. I get a feeling in my head that I can best describe as a thickness for lack of better words. That and also a warm and sometimes hot sensation on my skin almost like I am standing in front of a radiant heater. I hope this is a short one. Some only last a few minutes and are gone, leaving me tired.

I’m going to post this now. It’s getting hard for me to put words together and I’m misspelling and hitting the wrong keys. But first I want to say what we’re doing today. We will put a second coat of paint on the back room. I have the space heater there now to warm it up. There is a light frost on the ground. At two I have an appointment at the VA hospital in Big Spring. We will go there and then hit the Walmart to get gas and necessities such as eggs, milk, and cat litter. That’s a must.

Check back in later as I sometimes add to these posts as the day goes by. There’s a icon you can click on at the end of each post that will let you be notified each time I make one. Gotta get moving.

OK. Before I could post this I heard Cherie’s panicked voice yelling for help. Come to find out it was a scorpion. Instead of killing it I caught it and put it in a bottle. It probably won’t live long cause I crunched it a little but I wanted to get a good picture of it. As a kid we used to catch them and put them in a jar to watch them fight.

It’s already 7:00. We got back from Big Spring about forty minutes ago. The orientation at the VA hospital was pretty much what I expected with the exception that most of the staff who were to speak were not in today. No surprise considering how close we are to Christmas. Unfortunately a migraine started coming on while there and was in full force by the time we left. I did stop by the doctors office and told the nurse that I was concerned about taking the Hydrococone pain meds because of the outrageous amounts of Acetaminophen. I let her know that I had hepatitis C and took the year long interferon shots for it so was concerned for my liver, especially after reading the warning label on the bottle.

We went to Walmart after that and, not at all feeling good, I stayed in the car while Cherie went in to get the food we needed. While waiting for her my phone rang. It was the VA nurse. She said she talked to the doc and he said the acetaminophen levels were acceptable so I should go ahead and take it. NO I won’t. I’ve only got one liver and don’t feel like playing with it especially after the FDA just announced it was requiring stronger warning labels on the over the counter acetaminophen (Tylenol) because of studies they had just completed. Next I had to set up an appointment to see the doc and argue my case to get something different. That won’t be till February 14. I’ve endured some intense pain since I woke up and had refused strong medication because of having a problem with abusing them back before the wreck. Now that I’m doing some physical work the pain has gotten pretty bad so it’s something that will help me keep going.

After that I called my former secretary, Eileen. She didn’t answer so I called her daughter, Suzie. Suzie ran off a whole litany of stuff. She tends to be a bitter person but what she had to say seemed to justify that. Come to find out Eileen has moved out of her house into an apartment across the street. She had talked to me about letting her son Bobby move into her house with his wife and kids. I told her it would be tough for her to handle because the kids are not really controlled. Because of there environment it is not unusual to hear these kids, who are maybe ten years old, cussing like a sailor. F—this and F—that with no correction. Add to that mix Bobby’s serious alcoholism and it’s a unsettled household with Bobby and Nancy constantly fighting. No wonder Eileen moved out of her own house.

Of course her mom had died upstairs in her bedroom and her husband Glen died in the living room so there are lots of unpleasant memories there. Suzy told me that Bobby had taken the bad battery out of his van and switched it with Eileen’s without telling her. She had to get help when the car wouldn’t start at the grocery store. Then Bobby got possessive of what was in the house, not wanting his mom to get her furniture and things so Suzie said she and Calvin, her boyfriend, had to sneak in and retrieve some of it. At least the house payment is being made because Nancy’s dad gets her welfare check and sends in the payment. Otherwise Bobby would get a hold of it and drink it away.

While talking with Suzie the call waiting on my cell let me know that another call was coming in. It was Eileen. She was returning the call I had just made. Eileen said she was very happy in her new place, despite it being across the street. We talked quite a long time about how Mick, her one time boyfriend whom she almost married thirty or so years ago, was being cold after their brief reunion that had made her so happy and hopeful. Merle, another old flame who wanted to marry her has been back in the picture. I met him at the VOA when he was on work release from prison. When Eileen worked for me Merle would send her letters from prison to my company so her husband wouldn’t see them. We used to laugh at them as she showed me what they said and how he couldn’t spell. Merle had been a drug addict and was constantly in trouble with the law, burglarizing homes and businesses to support his habit. I wasn’t happy to hear he was calling her aggressively after Glen died but Eileen said he is clean and a changed person, working sometimes sixteen hour days and a steady job he has held for a while now. That eases my mind some. I told Eileen not to keep chasing after Mick cause she was better than that but if Merle was doting on her and not using her to go for it. “You deserve to be happy Eileen” I said. She also told me that she fractured her ribs but didn’t know how. At her age and the advanced Scoliosis I am sure her bone density is not good. She is my best friend. No one knows me like she does and she has been with me longer than anyone with the exception of the seventeen hellish years I spent with my second wife. Cherie and I both love her to death and she is one of the ones we helped financially when we got the first inheritance check.




I did finish painting the half of the back room Cherie and I did yesterday. The second coat made all the difference though I did have to put a third coat here where you can see how the first didn’t cover the bottom half of the wall well.





You can also see the original color of the walls. I call it nicotine yellow. Cherie is cleaning in the bedroom right now. The incident with the scorpion has inspired her to get everything off the floor she can and she is running the shop vac, with it’s powerful suction and long hose, through every crack and crevice she can reach. It’s a wonder how much motivation a scorpion can generate. I’m staying here in the office where it’s safe.

Doing well now. The headache is pretty much gone. Think I’ll call it a day soon. There are an increasing number of people reading this blog now. Of course it helps that I can go online whenever I want and keep this up to date. (more or less) Some of the new regulars are from Stanton, which I like cause it’ll let them get to know me. We are going to spend the rest of our life here so that will be good, at least for the most part. There is still a part of me that is unsure and a little paranoid of being ill thought of. I suppose that will always be there. I think I will go ahead and post this. Tomorrow will be a decent day but the cold is scheduled to come in Friday night with snow Saturday. We will keep the space heaters going though we can’t run more than two at a time in different parts of the house or we will blow the circuit breakers. Plus we learned we can’t have too many (that would actually be two) kitchen appliances on along with the bedroom heater cause they are all on the same circuit. When I rewire this house that’s one of the issues I intend to solve. Don’t know when that will be. I don’t know much about wiring a house other than electricity can kill you if you’re not careful. Careful I’ll be and besides that I’ve got a book that explains it in simple terms. Getting the wire to the plugs through the walls may be the hardest part. That will be a ways down the road because of finances. No money no fixey

Good night all. God willing I'll be back tomorrow