He had to take more of the prep stuff at 2:30 a.m. per the instructions. And then neither of us got any sleep before his 6:30 a.m. appointment.

The great news was things looked great.

I got my hearing aids reprogrammed in the late afternoon.

We ate dinner and then it hit. I don’t think I have an appendix anymore, but if I do that might be it.

And typing this is all the sitting up I’m going to do for now.

Edited to add in the morning: I was able to get some fluids down after dinner didn’t stay there, then slept for 11 hours. I’m doing much better now.

I don’t think I’ve bought any such thing since I last had a small child with an upset stomach–I had to find a Safeway employee to help me find the stuff.

They tried to feed it to me when I was in the hospital till I told an orderly who was tasked with delivering it five times a day that “I would have to be dying to eat that stuff. And I’m not dying anymore.”

The guy laughed and I never saw him nor it again.

So. No red. No blue. No orange.

Well at least at that store that left a single option. Food-wise, lemon jello and only lemon jello all day, poor guy.

His last colonoscopy, with a doctor who has since retired, the redhead gene won out and he started chatting up the doctor with questions about the cool stuff he was seeing on the screen because the anesthesia was not doing its job.

I am told that got fixed rather fast.

So I guess tomorrow we find out if the new doctor read his chart?

I went in yesterday to get my five-year-old hearing aids cleaned and checked out.

Each one has two microphones: behind and inside the ear. Turns out the inner one on the left was slowly dying.

Well, now I knew why I’d made that appointment, good to know. They ordered a new one made and told me to come back in three weeks when it gets in.

It wasn’t till I got home and had conversations with family that I knew I should be able to hear in the rooms we were standing in that I went, Wait. That’s not a left-aid thing only, something’s way off. Everything sounded tinny and quite faint.

I sent them a note: when they were testing the programming, could it be that they didn’t get them set back to the correct ones?

Yes it could. They were apologetic and set me up to come back; the last slot on Friday was the earliest they could squeeze me in.

I find myself realizing just how good these aids normally are and what a difference they usually make. It’s been an interesting lesson in appreciation.

And man, I wish I knew where I carefully put my old set so I wouldn’t lose them as backups. (No worries, Mom: the ones I had my audiologist set up for Dad was the previous-previous pair.)

So at that dinner last night.

An improved caption app on my phone means I can actually follow a conversation in a less than quiet environment. It wasn’t till today that I realized that she wasn’t expecting that. I don’t think she would have said this in front of me if she had.

There was an elderly woman and she was not talking directly to me when she lamented that (and it sounded like an out-of-context talking point straight from her preferred vulpine network) “A thousand churches in the US have been shut down and taken over as mosques. It’s the fall of civilization.”

The other person shrugged a yeah, okay, whatever, hon, and the subject was dropped.

I wanted to say, So people are still going to church (let’s not quibble over the cultural words for such), still looking for community, still trying to live up to their religions by holding themselves accountable before their fellow man simply by showing up to be reminded of their duty towards their fellow man and belief in G_d together. Cool.

Except that I knew she wouldn’t be able to hear me in both senses of the word if I tried.

But I did find a moment later to tell her that a friend of mine had been at university in the US when the Shah fell, and she knew if she went back she’d be perceived as an American and in great danger. So she married a man in the same boat and they raised their family here.

When their daughter got engaged the dad made a point that he did not want her to do the American thing of living together out of wedlock. The family wanted to throw a big wedding for her. He wanted her to wait.

Since the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is very big on the waiting for marriage thing, I knew that that would mean something to my friend and maybe open her eyes a little.

To honor her parents, the couple chose to slip off to the courthouse and quietly get married there first so that they would be doing it right before G_d, or at the very least her parents’ perception of such: the commitment to each other comes first.

Maybe I got through a little bit. She seemed glad to hear of it.

We waited till I seemed to be over my germ and then found that we could make a group appointment at CVS for the flu and covid vaccines. Our Costco didn’t have the new covid in stock, CVS could offer pretty much instant gratification.

Woke up this morning feeling like, well, that was the easiest one yet. Five stars. Highly recommend.

And yeah, I missed the last six-month covid booster and paid dearly for it. Not going to miss it again.

Three years away, she had to reestablish herself as a local patient. Every officially first-time appointment takes longer. Today was the day three departments  wanted to see her, and a twist of fate was such that I got to drive her.

We had to be on the road by seven, then again in the early afternoon, and then, different city and rush hour, the last one, which we actually got to three minutes early. Yay.

The first one, um, tried.

The others were great.

A motion-sensor chime went off: someone was at the door. I went to go retrieve the package-?

He’d been nicely groomed and you could see his sweet face. His tail was wagging happily at the sniffing all the new smells: roses! Holly bush! Azalea plants!

I walked to the front of the house to see if the little guy’s owners were coming right up behind–I know he’s always on leash when they’re on walks–but they were nowhere in sight.

He ran next door and that had to have been even more fun because they have a white dog about his size. Who was not coming out to play; when I called, he came back over to me.

Not the least bit skittish. He let me pet him. (So soft!) But I had no leash to help take him home.

And then he sat. And looked up at me. He seemed to be expecting something.

Would he let me pick him up? He would, quite happily, that tail and those big eyes and lashes looking up into my face as if he’d discovered his very bestest friend and I always thought he was cute but let me tell you, that little dog melted my heart right there. He didn’t wriggle nor try to get down, he was where he wanted to be.

Nobody answered the door at his house.

I finally stepped back a bit and saw that their gate was open. Mystery solved. I walked over there thinking I would put him down in there and quietly close it behind him, but a plumber was on the other side of the yard and I got glimpses of the neighbor on the other side of him.

I called out his name: Would he like his puppy back?

The two of them walked over towards me, chuckling, and the neighbor took up his small dog fondly into his arms and I had to let it go.

The fridge door wouldn’t close. There was nothing in the way. We finally tried leaning against it a moment and it thankfully stayed shut after that.

This had to be tracked down.

And so the lower drawers got pulled out, even though it’s hard to with that door not quite opening wide enough ever, and scrubbed and dried and re-organized.

You know those single-servings of guacamole that Costco sells?

Three had fallen behind the back of the drawer, pushing it forward. There’s your easy fix.

But look, Mom, she said: the glass shelf. It’s tilted. The supports are not even to each other anymore.

Oh well. It’s 32 years old.

It looked really great now and the door shut just fine. Call that one user error.

Still. If anyone has good things to say about any manufacturer whatsoever who actually responds to warranty complaints with integrity–but whose refrigerators seldom need such–I would dearly love to know.

Nice old house.

And then you get to picture #6 and go: what on earth?!

Next you notice the books on the shelf to the right leaning and tilting forward to match the threatened trajectory of the ceiling that is just daring that next earthquake to come mess with it.

At first I thought it was the edges of countless old books dangling down and thought well that’s one weird way to not toss them in the landfill, but no, it’s split firewood, ready for the wood-burning stove but stacked and nailed in waves to the ceiling with the stove’s pipe upwards directly touching them.

I remember my dad’s big stack of firewood in the backyard and how it became prime chipmunk and bird habitat and who knows what all else and wishing I could see what it felt like to go inside and nest in there and explore all the little places.

Well there you go!

I have questions.

Grapes have zinc. Zinc helps fight off colds. Grape smoothies. Placebo effect is traditionally 50% so I figure we really can’t lose on that one.

I have half a hat that needs to meet its other half. Old Neighborhood Fiber Co stash.

Today was a secondary infection day with a side of severe dehydration. I’m glad I got through it.

Update: and this morning (Thursday) is starting off much, much, much better.

Scene: after dinner.

One hand holding an It’s It mini ice cream sandwich (with an oatmeal cookie! Healthy, right?), one hand texting a friend back, one hand trying to put puzzle pieces together without getting any ice cream on them.

When you’re doing the three-handed Mom special, you know the end of the germ is closer.

That and I supposedly got to the end of the cowl, weighed the last of the yarn, did the calculations, and decided I could play yarn chicken for a last half-repeat after all.

Maybe I should actually go finish that before I say that.

Oh look, I got the date wrong in yesterday’s header. Figures.

That blood pressure reading was actually taken after I got the first 8 oz fluid down yesterday, which helped raise it enough that I could at least move; I was too wiped to go back and word that more precisely.

A normal sick day today was such a relief. Drank my hot cocoa out of a paper cup because the stoneware was too heavy and enjoyed every sip. Meanwhile, the covid tests are on the way.

Thank you, everybody. Please get your shots updated–trust me when I say they’re worth it.

Richard told me calling an ambulance was the next step if I couldn’t get fluids down after I said there was no way I could sit up, much less walk to the car for IV rehydration in Urgent Care. He took my blood pressure: 84/46.

It is a relief to be able to be up and slightly about again. Yay for sleep and for kids’ milk boxes with straws in the earthquake supplies–that’s about as no-effort fluids as you can get.

I felt fine yesterday.

Covid cases have been high here lately. I’ve been waiting for the latest update on the vaccine, figuring I’ll do that and the flu shot together. At the same time, though, I wasn’t checking every day to see if it was out yet because I’ve been fighting off the edge of a Crohn’s flare for three weeks–they ruled out 17 pathogens last week–and I hoped my immune system could settle down first before giving it a jolt.

Oh look, the FDA approved it today, with shipping holding its breath for the word. Let the mad scramble for doses begin.

My GI doctor retired, the next one quit Sutter Health, so did the one after that, and as an officially new patient to the new guy he can’t get me in till November. Although I did get told to, if I need it, go see my primary care to get her to get his attention to get me in sooner. Said by the person I saw because I couldn’t get in to see my primary care doctor. Still. Seventeen tests: we got that bit of diagnostics out of the way.

Things are better than last week and it is definitely not bad–I’ve lived through bad and this is not it–so I’ve been keeping that thought as a backup.

I just hope the unexpected sore throat that started last night didn’t reach anyone else.