May 10 - 26, 2009

From an overcast and rainy MO,

The last couple of weeks have been rather busy - at least for two old fogies.

Jim saw our family doctor on the 13th relative to the sugar count and his frequent flare-ups with his Meniere's problem. He is now monitoring his blood sugar and will report back to the doctor. He is now taking anti-nausea/vertigo medicine three times a day and seems to be doing much better. The problem is that when he feels better, then he thinks he can stop taking the medicine.

On the 16th we went to district track at Excelsior Springs and on the 23rd to sectional track at Kearney. In district, if you are in the top four - then you go on to the sectional meet - and again if you are in the top four - you progress to state which is this coming weekend. We will go to Jefferson City on the 30th to see two of our pole vaulters compete.

We decorated graves (my side) at Marceline and New Cambria on the 21st and went to five cemeteries in the Trenton/Edinburg area on the 22nd for Jim's side of the family. One is a very old, neglected cemetery and we had not been there for a few years. This cemetery is evidently not mowed as there was evidence of a recent fire for that specific area. The granite stones seem to hold up okay, but the old sandstone ones look like charcoal. Another of the cemeteries that had started to go downhill has been adopted by an area family with one of the son's using its refurbishing as an Eagle Scout project.

One Sunday, May 24, we went to a place called Leisure Lake (northwest of Trenton) to the Fulkerson reunion. There were only 25 people there this year - down from previous years. The food was catered and was good midwest cooking. The mashed potatoes and gravy were worth another trip there - even if only to eat the mashed potatoes and gravy. They also had an excellent assortment of desserts - and I didn't hear anyone complain about them either.

We have sent what will be our final appeal to the post office in Washington, DC about the package we insured in February that never was delivered to Doug and Dara. The Pflugerville post office claims that since they have a signature (unreadable, and obviously not Doug or Dara's) the post office does not have to pay for the insured package. We filed a claim first through our local post office, and that came back negative since Pflugerville could show a signature. We made a trip to Pflugerville (a little over 800 miles one way for us) the latter part of March and were informed that they were sending a postal inspector out to check the delivery - and as of today, have not been able to get any response from them other than someone was supposed to have notified us. The second claim went through the St. Louis post office branch - and again was turned down. The one we sent today to WDC also had copies go to the two Senators from Texas and the two from Missouri. I just got through mailing them at the post office and the woman there who has been so helpful, said that the post office usually takes another look when they hear from a Senator! To have insured a package for $400 - and to then get the run around from the postal system - makes you realize they would never survive in the private business world!

I continue to do the collection envelopes for Mobile Meals every Friday - while Jim has spent most afternoons at the high school pole vault area. The girls are being kept busy with young rabbits that make the error of venturing into our backyard. Abby caught one while three young neighbor boys were here. They were quite upset and one mother gave them a box to bring the injured rabbit home. It died less than two days later. I spotted another young rabbit in the backyard yesterday, but it somehow managed to escape Abby. Trixie likes to be a cheerleader and bark, but she doesn't actively go after the rabbits.

I picked up a chemo cap to knit this afternoon - first time in several weeks. Hopefully this is a good sign that I have some energy returning.

Be safe.
B.

May 9 - part 2

I neglected to mention that the pain in the right "flank" appears to have almost disappeared. I have been off the generic Vicodin for two weeks. I consider this progress.

Our long term feud with the US postal system continues. Jim filed the first notice when we realized the package had not been delivered to Doug and Dara - rather someone else had signed the receipt with an unreadable scrawl (pkg. insured for $400.)

We wrote an appeals to St. Louis which included a summary plus photo copies of all documents - and we have been notified that this has also been turned down. We will send an appeal to Washington, DC next - and we have decided to include xerox copies of all documents to the two US Senators from Texas as well as the two US Senators from MO - as well as our representative to the House of Representatives. I find the failure to respond to obvious carelessness on the part of the person who delivered the package quite appalling.

B.

April 14-May 9

From what is now spring in MO,

I didn't realize it had been so long since I updated - guess we have been busy.

On April 14, we headed to Maryville for a large high school track meet. It was cool, but quite tolerable - and it helped be dressed appropriately. We stopped at St. Joseph on the way home and enjoyed a late meal at Red Lobster - don't remember when we got back to Chilli, but it had to be late for us.

Margaret V. hosted a brunch at her home on April 20. She and Larry spent many hours doing marvelous detail work on their home and it is a good experience to go there. The various Thursday morning breakfast ladies brought lots of good food - I was the lazy one as I brought flavored pecans that we had purchased while in Austin.

On the 21st, we went to Cameron for their relays and then went to Ex. Springs on the 24 for their relays. The latter is quite comfy as they have comfortable seating - no bleachers there. The weather was great and again we were home late, but not nearly as late as those who stayed until the end of the meet.

On May 2, we made a very early trip to St. Joseph as the pole vault started at 8:00 a.m. The host school does not have a pole vault area and since several of the vaulters are also runners - one is even a weight person - the vaulters had to be finished and transported to Lafayette so that they could compete when the meet started there (10:00 a.m. for field events and noon for running events.) Jim and I had lunch at 54th Street at the North Shoppes. We made a brief stop at Borders - then headed home. We had left at 6:00 a.m. and arrived home about 3:00. A long day for us.

This week we went to Carrollton on Monday to a middle school track meet. Jim started working with three eighth graders who wanted to pole vault and they did quite well - considering he had only worked with them two or three days. On Thursday we went to Warrensburg for another middle school track meet. This one had some very large schools - one from Jefferson City, and it was quickly apparent that many of the various schools had started their athletes several weeks ago. Jim was quite proud of of kids as they handled the "stress" quite well.

On Friday (yesterday), I joined several others from the Thursday morning breakfast group to help Clara R. in a special services class room (she sometimes is called in as a subsitute para professional). She had made blank cards, cut out items to paste on, had stickers and blings, and had made some note cards with prompts such as "I love it when you ...", "Thank you for...", etc. for the students to make Mother's Day cards. One or two made the cards for other main relatives in their lives. Clara is such a dear and loves doing things like this.

Jim has gone to most afternoon pole vault practices and I have done envelopes for Mobile Meals each Friday. It seems we don't have major projects, but we do keep busy. Jim used the electric chain saw to remove a large limb from our red bud tree - it seemed to have more dead area than live. He sprayed the area where he cut, trimmed the assorted branches and a neighbor took the larger pieces, and we carted the smaller branches to the backyard where we will eventually cut them into small pieces.

Jim has had three flare-ups with his Meniere's problem. The first of these was last Friday at practice with only the three eighth graders there. They found him a chair, he called me to bring his medication and water, they offered to help him to the truck, but he leaned on me instead. This was only a minor flare-up and by the time he even drove the truck home, he was navigating much better. He thinks it was darting his eyes around - runway, take-off, going up, and coming down that might have caused this. The second flare-up was early Saturday morning when he got out of bed. He was better by the time he got upstairs, but I drove to St. Joseph to the track meet. After church on Sunday, there is a coffee time in the basement which we enjoy. He caught my attention within about 20 or 30 minutes that he needed to get to the car as he was getting wobbly. One of his former students walked with him up the stairs and to the car. By the time we got home (I drove) he had some difficulty getting into the house and was quickly in his recliner. He had taken his medication that morning (he is usually quite good about doing this), but this flare-up we later called moderate (we have three levels of description) as he spent about 2 or 3 hours in the recliner before he felt like he could get to bed. We call it major when he breaks out into a sweat that lasts about 3 to 4 hours. He sees our family doctor this coming Monday so we will see what transpires then. When the nurse called from his cardiologist, his bloodwork for cholesterol was fine, but the doctor expressed concern about the blood sugar level (I assumed high, but now realize I failed to ask which direction.)

Today we made a quick trip to Jamesport to go by our "favorite" grocery store. I spotted a brochure for "artisan" cheese and eventually we found the shop on our second try. The cheese is excellent and we will definitely go back. We then went on to Trenton to Barnes Greenhouse where we bought six tomato plants. They are now planted and tomorrow we will put mulch around them (cages were put up today). I have eleven flower pots planted - so have finished for this season. Now it is just a process of watering them each day when we don't get rain.

Activities coming up for us: Monday 11 - going to Brookfield to hear a presentation on the Hannibal St. Joseph Railroad, Tuesday 12 - going to St. Joseph to the Benton Relays, Wednesday 13 - Jim sees our family doctor, Saturday 16 - district track, Sunday 17 - high school graduation (we will attend a reception afterwards for one of Jim's senior pole vaulters), Thursday 21 - Margaret flies in from LA, Saturday 23 - sectional track, Sunday 24 - Fulkerson reunion, Thursday 28 - Margaret flies to LA, Friday 29 - state track (vaulters must be in top 4 at district and then top 4 at sectional to qualify), June 1 - meet a teacher friend in KC for a few hours, and June 16 - I have another CT scan.

When you add to this Jim joining the guys for breakfast 2 or 3 times a week, my weekly Thursday breakfast group, and whatever might come up - we keep as busy as we want.

Be careful,
B.