Is there a doctor in the house?

I got a phone call from my doctor's nurse to set up an appointment to talk about my lab work and my swollen feet.  It is set for May 18th I think  (I wrote it down in my organizer)leaving me weeks to fret over what gives.  I looked up my lab results  on line and there are some that are really high and some really low, but I have long since forgotten what they pertain to.  It seems to me creatine and BUN are markers for kidney problems, but I am not sure  (I am a licensed  med tech can you believe it?).  I am determined to not look up these things online, it would only fuel my anxiety. They told us that no news is good news, and that they would call us if there was bad news, otherwise they would mail the results.

Yesterday I bought an Ottlite floor lamp to do my stitching.  I borrowed a small table top one to see how it is to stitch with one, and it is wonderful.  Might even do away with my magnifier, I shall see (get it, see?)  It was on sale, from $299.99 to 99.99, this for their top of the line model.  Hope it works out OK.  It is still a lot of money for crafting.  I guess it would work for splinter removing, and maybe for eyebrow plucking too.

I lost an almost new compact of face powder, Lancome brand.  I took it to the various skilled nursing places, along with the big short face brush to put it on.  My conclusion is that it got lifted while I was in one or the other places.  My aide at the last place said to hide my cash (all $5 dollars) as things were disappearing while patients were at therapy.  Lancome compacts run $35 or $40 apiece, so it would tempt someone who buys cosmetics at the grocery or drug store.  If it hadn't been new I wouldn't have minded so much, but we tore the room apart and it isn't here, and I don't remember seeing it or using it myself.   I think my eye liner is missing too, but that isn't a big loss.  I bought another compact from Sephora for $33 so it doesn't hurt too much.  Using makeup already used by someone else, yuck.  At one time you could buy used cosmetics on eBay, but they forbid it now, except for perfume, I think.  I remember being in one psychiatric hospital and having one of the patients ask to use my makeup, and I said no, but not very nicely I am afraid.  No boundaries.

Lancome is supposed to have a little diacritical over the e  but I don't remember how to do it.

There has been quite an uproar at the "Flosstube" group, a YoutubeI group for stitchers.  One of the members posted a risqué stitch project, leaning on the obscene side, and boy did things get hot.  Finally the admin people weighed in and said we're all adults, if you don't like it, pass on by.  That is the opposite of what I expected to happen, but good for them.  You'd think some members have never seen nudity, etc. before.

It is 3:30 am and I am back to bed.  Hope all is well with everyone, and that anyone who feels like stabbing something 10,000 times takes up cross stitching.

echo cardiogram

The home health nurse came yesterday and concurred with the doctors that I need blood work and an echo done to rule out causes of water retention before giving me a stronger diuretic.  I need to check out the functioning of the kidneys which have to cope with an extra amount of water.  I don't know if it is significant that the echo took nearly an hour, the one I had in the past was zip zip you're done.  I won't learn anything until later today (it is just past 1 am as I write this).  When I had an abnormal echo a few years ago it was followed by a cardiocath, and that doctor did not concur with the heart diagnosis the radiologist gave.  I will try to ignore everything until the doctors have a consensus.

I went a little crazy and ordered four beautiful cross stitch patterns on eBay.  They are all of cats, but not the cutie cartoon ones.  I will attempt to post photos here:

I figure it will take me about a zillion years to stitch these...

No more "Saving"

I am no longer going to save the "best" things for a special occasion.  Things like the good china, the nice jewelry, the linens, the designer clothes (not a lot there), the designer handbags (too much of those), the silver flatware (I have 4 sets, none bought by me I am glad to say).  What kind of special occasion was I planning to have?  Royalty?  Rich old uncle?  Who?  And it will give me great delight to have these things out of storage and put to use.

Of course I will have to wait until I can get upstairs to put this into practice.

I saw the ortho doctor yesterday and he said I may eventually get the nerves to regrow and thus be able to lift my toes when I walk.  Until that happens I will limp; but right now I am less worried about limping and more about falling.  I saw the xrays taken and man that is one walloping big knee in there.  I guess when you're going for six surgeries, put the knee in, take the knee out, put the spacer in take the spacer out, put this knee in, sounds like the hokey-pokey, and whoa I am getting dizzy.  Anyway, when all that happens in 6 months, they must go for the big-time replacement.

Special date

For everyone else, today is tax day; but for me this is the birthday of my husband.  He would have been 74.  Put like that, 74 sounds really old.  But even at 72 he was active, chair of the Literacy Volunteers, hauling stuff in the pickup, cutting down trees, renting a grinder to clear out the stumps to make it easier to mow, and lots of chores.  He enjoyed all of them.  Then out of the blue, Blam! he was gone.  From the time he heard he had lung cancer until he died was 6 weeks.  He had not smoked in 40 years, but I guess that was the cause of the cancer.  I miss him so much, I never thought he would go first, given all the health issues I have had.  Added to this is a financial crunch.  I am trying my best to cover all the bases and not fret over things I have missed.

I have been using Alexa to play music, it sounds fine to me although I have read that others find the sound quality to be lacking.  Right now I have an ear worm, no not physical, I have one tune playing over and over in my head.  The only cure I know of is to listen to more music in hopes of smothering the repeating tune.  Right now I am waiting for the therapist so that will have to be done later.

The nail lady brought a light to see my nails better.  She wanted to leave it here, and I am really pleased.  It is an Ott light, the one all the hand crafters rave over, and now I can give it a trial run over the next two weeks to see if I like it for doing cross stitch.  It has a very blue tint to it, I think.  Several days ago I got my Lacis stand, that fastens to the embroidery hoop and can be adjusted up down and sideways I think.  I haven't quite gotten the hang of it yet, but I think it will be OK.  I find that holding the hoop in my left hand to stitch leaves my hand incredibly sore after only a short time.

The therapist is due shortly.  Wishing all those reading this to have a wonderful day, and hoping that everyone will have a stress-free time with their taxes.

Miscellaneous

Time is zipping past now, I can hardly believe I have been home from the hospital for a month.  I am in the process of catching up with all the appointments that I had to reschedule when the knee replacement surgeries went on and on, starting back in June.  The two I haven't gotten caught up are the financial adviser and the dentist.  They both have one or more steps to get in the building (and out) and when I tried to do a step up on just one here at home, my knee buckled.  So I have been working here at home on the exercising and trying to be cautious but not panicky.  Considering how long it has been to just get home, I think cautious is the name of the current game.  I am using the gait belt too.

New gutters will go up soon, depending on their schedule and the weather.  It snowed Friday night, and right now it is the the 20s, so spring may be turning into summer without spring weather at all.  I hate it, I have been turning the heat in this room to a higher setting, then cooking in here and turning it down again.  I am wearing sweaters and sweatshirts-- It is April!  And sleeping under a blanket!  The horse has been in a stall for several weeks as the ground is so slippery, she would fall and hurt herself; the last thing we need is another vet bill.  She still shows the effect of her 'stroke' several weeks ago, her eye, tongue, righthand legs, droopy ear, it makes me sad to think of how peppy she was last spring.  I still can't get to the barn with the path so rough, thank god for C, my son, able to shoulder so much of the duties I can't get to.  I give him $ and pay his health insurance, but still...

And thinking of money outflow, I finished our income taxes yesterday and it was worse than I expected.  The big difference is going from married filing jointly to going to Single, now that N passed in 2016.  I will pay estimated taxes so that this doesn't happen next year.  And itemizing is a joke, I dredge up all the items paid and then be better off taking the standard deduction.  I blame Trump and the Rep. in congress for doing this.  If they mess up Medicare and SSN I don't think any of them will win another term.  Especially Trump.

I have been working on my cross-stitch again.  I couldn't do it in the rehab places at all, holding it above me while I am flat in bed.  And the bad lighting and interruptions too.  Anyway, it's not like I have a deadline to meet.  I am finding shopping at Amazon is still fun, only if it is very cheap of course like $20 max.  And the items are very eclectic, plant fertilizer and a garfield eraser for example.  I see things I would like to get, but nah, I have enough do-dads that I can't even remember what I did get.

The next thing after the gutters will be getting someone to take down a dead tree that would fall onto the power lines in a strong wind.  It is an ash tree (I think) that was killed by borers; then followed by woodpeckers stripping off the bark to get to the insects.  And it was a beautiful tree too.

And the cats are enjoying all the boxes my little odds and ends come in too.

No fooling around here

It is April first, but I am not fond of practical jokes, or any joke that makes the listener the butt of the joke.  The student paper, which is quite nasty at times, doesn't come out on Sunday, so we are clear of that; unless they bring the paper out tomorrow.  One year it was entirely printed with bathroom jokes, this is for college age writers, not junior high school.  Some of the issues have been very clever, where you read the headline and think, What?! and then realize it is the first of April.  Now the jokes have given over completely  to the nasty, I am afraid.

I am currently wearing my latest craft project, a shark's tooth pendant on a black steel chain.  Many years ago I found a pretty large tooth in Murrell's Inlet, South Carolina at the water's edge which had been dredged and then the sand thrown up high on the beach.  We looked for quite a while and found many small teeth.  The only way to get big ones is with scuba gear.  Anyway the biggest one was found with hole already through the tooth, perfect for hanging as a pendant.  I wore it off and on for many years, and one of the tips finally broke off.  So I bought one (on Amazon, of course) and yesterday a glue (with Gorilla glue) was used to attach a finding (?) onto the back side.  It has been 24 hours so I am wearing here in the house so that if it comes off I can find it.  I will insert a photo here

And now you know how big the tooth is.  I would guess it is not as old as the solid black teeth, but I'm not picky.

All out of topics, bye for now, peace.