Perpetual Ruminations

Tuesday

I was just going to say, it's been a few days since I was in here, but it's closer to a week since I have been. Where does the time go?

Well, last Thursday I was going to try and get something going for my story for the 52 Week Challenge, but it just didn't want to develop. I did get some research done, found some names, and started a general outline. Some of this was done in the form of notes, although without much organization, the story line was more in my head, and some odds and ends from my research were jotted down amoungst the names and who was to be who.

I was having a bit of a difficult day on Thursday, one of the surgical sights was bothering and I was feeling pretty tired. I think the tired was just from waking so much through the night, but it may have also been a side effect of the pain and discomofort of trying to sit up and work on the computer. Between the discomfort, the bouts of pain, and being tired, I just couldn't get motivated to do much of anything. I did manage to make a nice dinner for Rhonda, however. In fact, it was kind of nice to spend more time on my feet, since sitting was being a pain -- sorry for the pun.

Friday was a better day, and I had a nice morning before diving into my story. After an early lunch, around eleven, I began to write and move forward with the story. I had gotten about two and a half pages of it started on Thursday, so it wasn't a cold start, but I did need to go over that start and make a few minor changes before I continued on. It went pretty smooth and soon I was working on page six; things were flowing and I was getting into it pretty good.

But I was interupted, the dogs were acting up and I had to stop to see what was going on. My brother was here. He had come over to let the dogs out while I was in surgery, and had mowed part of the yard. The mower threw the belt and he had come down to see how I was doing a couple days after I was home from surgery as well as to put a new belt on the rider. Unfortunately, it was the wrong belt, two choices for that mower and he had the wrong one. That's the way it goes.

On Friday he showed up with the other belt. I had talked to him on Thursday, and he thought he would come over on Saturday, or maybe even Sunday, so I was not expecting him. Also, I had asked him to call first, just so I could know he was coming over. No call, and he brought his girlfriend with, since she had the day off. She's a bit different in her thinking than my wife and I, and it tends to be a bit of a personality conflict with her, but we try to be tolerant for my brother. This visit was much the same with her, doing things contrary to how I wanted them done, listening ot her unfounded advise which was not asked for, and just putting up with her nosing around.

I knew I wouldn't get anymore writing done until after he left, so i clicked on save, then closed the word processor program and went out to see how the mower was coming along.  He was just getting the new belt on, and I aassisted what little I could and visited while he worked. Once he had it done, and working great, he mowed just a little to try it out. I think he was going to mow more, or else she was while he worked on a tree that had come down a month back.

the tree had blocked the road a bit, so I had trimmed it enough to clear the road, but it needed to be cut up and cleared yet. He had mentioned it before, and I had told him once I was feeling better, I would use my chainsaw and cut it up for firewood. He has an electric chainsaw, and had brought it, along with a long cord, determined to get it out of here. I didn't mind, and mentioned again that I was looking forward to restocking firewood for the firepit, and even told him to take some if he needed it. Of course, it would need some drying time, but by next spring it should be ready.

I also told him I was up to mowing, that riding around on the rider wouldn't bother anything with my recent surgery. It didn't, but I did get kind of sore from the bouncing and jostling. While I mowed up around the house, he, with the help of his girlfriend, cut up the downed tree. I knew something was up when she came up by the house and got in his truck adn drove it back down. But, in diplomacy, I just left it alone and continued mowing.

Now, a few years back, a huge willow tree had come down in the same general area. It had been mostly dead and snapped off in a terrible wind storm. I had cut up what I could, but my saw was just too small to handle this huge tree. I was able to cut the bigger part into three long lengths, about eight feet long. the first of these cuts wasn't too bad, I just had to cut from the top and each side. The bottom here was off the ground about thee inches, and I cut right through. But when this section cut free, the rest settled down onto the turf, so in order to cut through, I had to run the blade into the dirt just a bit. Again, I cut from the top, then one side, and then the other. Once I was close to the bottom, I was able to work the saw's bar through and cut the bottom, working the saw up until it just wouldn't go anymore. Then, I cut down and thought I would have two pieces. But the saw wasn't long enough and it didn't quite cut through.

My neighbor brought his big tractor over, just out of the blue, and was able to lift this massive chunck, and the cut was deep enough that it broke off where I had been cutting. He even hauled the big parts out to the local dump, which is open for brush and wood only. It was nice to have the help, and he didn't even rut up the ground around the tree much. He did dig a few when he tried to bust the stump, which was about six foot up where it had busted in the wind, but it was too solid. So, we have been gathering dead branches and sticks, piling them on the stump and burning it a couple of times a year. We have it almost burned out now, and one more good burn would likely be the end of it. With this in mind, I told my brother and his gal to just throw the branches on the pile we had been gathering over the summer, so we could burn the stump out. the rest of the wood, that was big enough to burn in the firering, just stack it up and when honda gets home with the Jimmy, we can haul it up and stack it.

Instead, they hauled everything out, the good firewood, and the branches. The local dump was locked, so he had to got to the regional landfill, which cost him a few dollars to discard it all. Now, I'm grateful for the help getting it cleaned up, and I really didn't intend for him to do any of this, but it was a very nice gesture. but, it burned up my entire day, I lost the firewood, and if they had more room for branches, his girlfriend informed me they would have unstacked my burn pile and hauled that, too. Why? I specifically said how to do it, it would have been closer to toss the branches on the pile than to haul them up to the truck, and it would have been less work for them to leave the chunks of firewood. But, that is why I don't get along with her. If she has an oppertunity to do something like that, she will go out of her way to do it. I, however, did good and said not a word. It wouldn't do anygood, it hasn't in the past, and I know it upsets him a great deal.

But, that was my Friday. Saturday I was pretty stiff and sore from mowing the half I did get done before running out of gas, so I didn't do much. I took it easy and enjoyed having Rhonda home, spending some time together before working on my story. When I opened it, I was horified to see my save had not worked. None of the work I did on friday was there, and I was greatly disapointed. But, since I have M.S. Office 365, I have cloud storage for my documents as well as a lot of other files. I use this mostly for work, but also have my writing files backed up there. Thankfully, One Drive had kept backup copies of everything and I found all my changes and additions in the clouds. I was pretty happy, especially since One Drive has not been working right since I updated to Windows 10 on this old laptop.

I was able to pick up where I left off, and soon had the story done. Well, not real soon, about four hours, maybe three, I wasn't counting. I read it to Rhonda and she said it was another good one. She either reads my story after I get it done, or I read it to her, depending on length. Then, she puts a checkmark on the white-board I use to log my Weekly Challenge. she had dinner about done when I finished, so we enjoyed a nice dinner and then relaxed for the evening.

Sunday I spent the day with Rhonda, just kind of relaxing and enjoying the day together. We needed to get some groceries so we went shopping together, something we have not done much of lately. I enjoyed it, but by the time we got home, was hurting a lot. I also had a bulge under the incission for my hernia repair. I hadn't noticed it before, but then, I hadn't really felt around there, either.

Monday I had to leave early to get to my appointment for the followup for surgery. We spent two hours driving down to Sioux Falls, spent five minutes in the waiting room, then another five minutes with the doctor and I was on my way back home, another two hours. But, it was all good news, the lump is typical, and is just swelling under the muscle he cut throw. He did say it was a pretty deep wound and would need another two or three, maybe even four weeks to heal up. But, he lifted all restrictions, telling me to just take it easy and ease back into things gradually. He also said that it was very unlikely I would injure anything if I did too much, but I'd sure hurt from it.

I'll follow his advise and ease into things. I'm also following his advice aobut talking to another doctor for sleep apnea. I don't know where this will lead, but he thinks it's a good idea for me to have this checked out and follow through with surgery if required. Rhonda also agrees with this, and she knows more than anyone what happenes while I sleep. I know I wake often, and I answered most of the questions that indicate sleep apnea, I'm a prime target for it, and Rhonda confirms that I do stop breathing fairly often while I sleep. So, more tests and more treatments, but it also seems like the worst of all of this is finally over.