NO blog tonite

Nasturtiums

Underside of a Sunflower

A new and a dying Squash blossom

I have done some damage to my back that makes it impossible to sit for more than 5 minutes.  I don't type well standing up. But here are some pictures I took before the body went on exile.

Until next week!

Time marches on

The best thing about the future is that it comes one day at a time.
Abraham Lincoln 

I will be 60 in January. ARGH. I remember when I thought I would be dead at 42. It was just this number I had in my head. Obviously I was wrong. Now I have no idea. Except that I have a lot to do, so I hope it is a couple of dozen years in the future. 

Sometimes I am painfully aware of how I got here and where I am. A few weeks back I found out a few things about my health that made me scratch my head. One was a pre-cancerous condition in a very odd place. My family, either side of my family does not get cancer. Really. Everyone dies of a heart attack either in their sleep, or they drop dead. So to come up with something that might turn into cancer was just baffling. So I am on a topical ointment for the long term. Then I found out I had a vitamin D deficiency. Me, the gardener person. They prescribed Vitamin D supplements, and they are readily available, and so far, the sun shines every day so I am not concerned. But this is the second time in a six month period that my blood work showed too much iron. I had to research that one. It is probably one of the most serious health things I have going on. It explains a few things. The symptoms are the same as having too little, but the potential health risks are very scary. One is that cancer loves iron. If you increase iron intake to cancer ridden mice the cancer will grow. Iron is a heavy metal, so it lodges in your organs, and your brain. You can eliminate it from your blood by donating a pint on a regular basis, which makes your body pull it out of your organs. But your brain is another matter. There are chelation therapies that will cross the membrane that protects your brain, but as you can imagine they have side effects. Iron overload can create high blood pressure ( I have that ) and high cholesterol ( huh, I have that too ), and diabetes ( they are warning me about that ) and memory loss. It has been linked to Alzheimers. I just thought I was getting old and forgetful.

So the first thing I did was go out and get bottled water. I am sure drinking well water is not helping. It requires quite a filtering system to take out iron. Reverse osmosis. Expensive, not going there. Then I looked at the diet aspect. NO more red meat, or dairy, or alcohol, or sugar ( no surprise there it feeds cancer too ) but it includes fruit. That just seems wrong! I am careful with those as well. I hardly ever drink any more. Steak is just too expensive. The diet that I stick to most of the time is actually good for me. Beans, rice, whole grains. I stay away from white flour, turns out that all those enriched foods are enriched with IRON. There are supplements that help remove it, and things you can do. 

Anyway it has made me appreciate the days that I have a lot of energy, the days I feel my brain is working well, It explains a few things. I wish the county thought it was as important as the vitamin D, the sleep apnea, or the pre cancerous condition. I am grateful for the temporary part-time Doctor who had the foresight to order the extra test. Too bad she is gone. The guy who replace her was leaving too. He ordered a huge panel. Have your iron checked. They need to check the serum levels and the levels in your body that are not in your blood. It is a silent epidemic. 

So one day at a time has taken on new significance. I hope you are blessed with good health. 

Speedy recovery, old friend

No Quote this time, and a late blog.

Mt Diablo is on Fire. Mt Diablo is not a huge mountain, but it rises up in the middle of Contra Costa County, and is everyone's reference point for where you are. So for it to be on fire is like watching a friend suffer. I lived in Contra Costa County  from the time I was a baby until 2000. Every day of my life that I was home I saw the mountain. The sun rising in the east defines the outline, the sun passing over head defines it contours, the sun setting in the west slowly lighting the side until the top is the the only rosy thing left.

It is the place you take out of state visitors. Not only is it beautiful, it has an amazing view of the county. There is an observation area at the top, and a light house. When the air quality was better you could see to Mt Rainer, and Mt. Shasta. The pay-as-you-go binoculars let you zero in on all sorts of things.  There are picnic areas, special rock outcrops, meadows, and oak forests. For most of us who have grown up in the area it is a friend. So to watch your friend burn, and in pain, is very hard.

It is also home to an abundance of wildlife, all of which are threatened in some way by the fire. Evacuating horses is not easy, but it is doable. The wild life that will flee this fire will be refugees running into areas that are not safe for them, across roads with cars that don't care about them. How far and fast can a little tree frog jump? The quail and other little birds will be going into territories that are not theirs, either looking for shelter and food. Will they know to return when the fire is over? I don't know. Their food will be gone, for some their homes will be gone.

This happened in 1977. It was bad then and from what I am reading, bad this time as well. It is burning on the east side which is very rugged. It is  now 45% contained, which is a relief. Speedy recovery old friend, rest well. 

Life's little surprizes

A lot of my work is a matter of reacting to surprises in life.
Alexander Wang 

A good day is when we get everything we want to get done, accomplished. It is finding a dollar on the ground. It is beating the rain by just enough to get the mower inside shut the door and walk into the house in time to hear the splat of raindrops on the porch. A good day is also having just enough money to pay the rent, getting it from the bank and coming home to find the sheriff parked in your yard, knowing that the alarm has gone off, but for some reason not being at all concerned. 

I always pay my rent in cash, so I was off to the bank today. I stopped at MIchael's to get some of those little rubber ends for sunglass holders, and then proceeded to the 99 cent store for a couple of pairs of cheaters ( eyes ) and indulged myself in a bag of tortilla chips. A word of warning to those who do not know me well, your chips are not safe with me. I will eat them all. I had just put a chip into my mouth when I turned off the levee road and saw a nice, shiny, black Sheriff's patrol cruiser sitting at the bottom of my drive way. OK. What happened?

 "Do you live here?" 
"Yes, I do" 
"I am responding to an alarm going off" 
"I figured" 
"How long were you gone?"
"Hour and a half at the most"
He told me he was waiting for his partner before he went inside. I didn't see smoke so I was fine as long as the animals were OK. Chalupa only barks if he recognizes the car, or someone comes up to the front door. There is a door to the garage at the bottom of the front stairs, it was open. Shit. Once we got to the question "Is there a way to get into the house from the garage?" and I said "No," he was moving, pulling a very large gun out of the holster and heading into the garage announcing "Coming in, if anyone is in here, show yourself. I have a gun and I will fire it." Gulp.

He finally determined the garage was secure, He believes the wind blew the door open, I am not so sure. The alarm is a siren, and it is REALLY LOUD and it goes to a alarm center and they will send a car if no one picks up the phone.  My landlords were in Lincoln one Christmas when their alarm went off. Someone had come in through a downstairs window that was not armed, into a back room, but when they opened the door to the garage they tripped the alarm. I know they took off like a shot. That time I never saw a patrol car. The alarm finally went off. It happened in the middle of the day so I called Fred and Clara and they came home. 

I checked the front door and it was still locked, we walked around the back. I am, very cautious about the back door because Amy, who had lived here before had been burglarized and that is when my landlord put in the security system. That time they came in through the back. The back door was locked and I saw nothing out of the ordinary. 

Nice guy, was going up in the helicopter later that day, I told him to fly over. I can hear him telling the pilot "That is 2485, we get all sorts of odd calls from her." I am sure they have a little file on me. Date, called about mail box break ins. Date, called about noise. Date, called about hunters to close to the Hwy on the Yolo side. Date, called about screeching metal and breaking glass, concerned about accident, Officers arrived to find garbage in driveway. Now this. Crazy single woman. I know I shut the door. 

The other part of today was getting all the lawns mowed just before the rain so with the new mown grass and the rain the air smells amazing. And there was that rainbow. If you didn't see it, then you missed out. Here it was a huge, double, semi circle. Brief and beautiful. I saw it from inside and when I got to the porch it had faded by half; in another 30 seconds it was gone. The rain was wonderful and now everything is all rinsed off. The crickets are singing, I am probably not going to sleep. No pictures, I need batteries for the camera.

Happy Labor Day, holiday over, back to work.