Beat Up, Bruised, and Battered

At 63 years old, you’d think I would have learned a lesson or two by now, but no I haven’t. I have managed yet again to add another injury to my growing list of them, and did while being alone. I have ridden my bicycle off a cliff and broke my collar bone, tripped on a sidewalk crack while running at a very fast pace and sustained multiple bruised ribs and a chest contusion, fallen down my garage stairs on my ass, etc! The latest solo crash and burn happened a few days ago while loading the truck for our annual camping trip with our friends, the Kellys. I had just started the chore with only one bike being loaded so far. The truck tailgate is a bit high to climb up and down for a fast approaching senior citizen, so I use a stepladder near the end of it to assist myself getting in and out. After getting the bike situated in the front of the truck bed, I prepared to exit by crawling to the tailgate, standing up on the gate, and taking a step down to the stepladder. I either missed it altogether or my foot slipped off the step and I fell from a standing position right onto the stepladder handle taking the hit right to my sternum. Not remembering how, but I ended up over the ladder and onto the driveway pavement with a gash on my ankle, and a scuffed up knee. I immediately jumped to my feet dazed, confused and the breath knocked out of me. As I mentioned before, Debbie was not home and I was too fuzzy to even know where my phone was, so I just stumbled around the driveway trying to catch my breath and realizing I couldn’t even see straight. There for a haunting moment, I thought I had done some serious damage to myself and was on the verge of passing out and became a bit scared for my own mortality. I managed to weave my way across the street to my neighbors house just to establish human contact in case I went down and became unconscious. To my shock and horror there was a note on their door posting they both had COVID…..Lord help me now!!! Their dog started barking and they saw me through the door window. I managed to get them to the door where the called another neighbor, a former nurse, to come over and help me!

The Culprit

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She arrived a few minutes later and escorted me back to my house. After checking my pupils and pulse rate, she suggested I head to the ER to get checked out and would even drive me. I refused thinking I would inevitably able to shake it off, so she demanded I go in and rest awhile. I went in and got a call off to Debbie and told her the story and she started on her way back home. At that moment, she was about an hour and a half away. I did as I intended and was going to just shake it off and possibly continue to load the truck. It did not take long to realize I needed to go to the ER. I called Debbie again and told here I was driving myself to the hospital and stayed on the phone with her until I arrived. Later, much later she also got to the hospital. It was to be nine hours later when we finally left!!! They took X-Rays, EKG, blood work, and a CAT scan. Luckily I walked away only with a severely bruised sternum, miscellaneous cuts and abrasions, my left shoulder was injured but don’t know the extent. Miraculously, no breaks or fractures were sustained. My shoulder has been bothering me for months from lifting in the gym and every time I sustain an injury, it gets exasperated. In the following days other injuries have risen in the aftermath: swollen left pectoral muscle and tricep, pain in my left bicep, and my shoulder is in constant pain. Now it seems it will be a long recovery period and we had no choice but to cancel our camping trip! I am left with being unable to twist, lift anything, unable to sleep flat, do anything strenuous around the house. Right now I am sleeping propped up and have just been able to get in and out of bed myself and put my shirt on. Debbie has been an angel through all this and I am so thankful to have her. I cannot imagine being alone through this injury as I have been in the past. It’s not fun being a careless idiot!!!

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What A Mess!!

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What A Summer So Far

While the rest of the country bakes in intense heat, we here in the Seattle area have yet to see a real summer. We have just barely hit 80 and have only flirted with the upper 70’s. You wouldn’t believe all the crying and whining about it! Me, I just sit back grinning from ear to ear because I love it and cannot stand hot weather anymore. I grew up in the heat and lived in it for much of the first part of my life and have had enough. I would not care if I ever saw an 80 degree day for the rest of my life. Unfortunately, it is driving Debbie and many others up here crazy, and I have to listen to it! I could just imagine the whining and whimpering if we were experiencing 120 degree heat indexes like a lot of the Midwest. You can have it! I just hope August doesn’t prove to be a scorcher. I am crossing my fingers!

Summer part two – now I try to stay healthy, maybe not hard enough. I have a few extra pounds hanging around me that I just can’t shake, but it is my own fault. I have sweet cravings these days that kick me in the gut. I love Schwan’s Peanut Butter Cup Ice Cream, and put a doughnut in front of me and I will inhale that unhealthy bastard before you can blink. Debbie can ignore all the unhealthy food products these days and is great health, in fact just lost around 70 pounds and has kept it off and looks and feels great! To try to offset my vices I try to stay active. We hike, ride bikes, walk Cordell around the neighborhood, and I run (well jog). I am not a fast runner, or a running fiend, just kind of like it and it helps to keep some of the baggage under control. Back in June I was out on one of my runs and my foot caught a unlevel sidewalk slab and I went down hard!! I road rashed my left knee and elbow, my face slammed in my left forearm and put a nasty bruise on it, and I bruised my left kidney and ribs and abdominal wall. I haven’t run or been the same since! There have been visits to the walk in clinic, hospital, doctors, and again recently to the ER at Swedish when my muscles in the left side of my abdomen went into spasms. Debbie and I spent a whole Saturday afternoon and evening sitting in an ER room! I would say that ruined our weekend. At this point there is really no treatment except to just let it heal, so I am impatiently trying to do just that! No running, lifting, pulling, pushing, sit ups, etc. I guess Debbie has to do everything 😉

With all this going on, we still managed to take the truck and trailer and go on a week-long camping trip. We met some of our great camping buddies down in Oregon just outside Sisters and did some camping out in the middle of the woods. We took Debbie’s gun and with Rob and Rich’s collection, we had an arsenal with which we did some target practice. Debbie and I love the Sisters/Bend area and may retire there! We parted from our friends and solo’d up to Toppenish and Leavenworth to finish out our trip. Did a lot of wine tasting and buying and found a great RV resort in Leavenworth which we will return many more times. Cordell was with us on our trip and he just loves going camping and loves being in the trailer. The truck did it’s job wonderfully.   Our next excursion is back down to Best Friends in Utah and we are toying with the idea of just driving down there with the trailer. We’ll see what happens! Look at our camping pictures at our photo page and now it is time to go back to work…..yuk!

Ahhhhhh Fall

Yes it has arrived and I love it! Fall is definitely my favorite time of year. The days are slowly getting shorter and the nights have that new crispness and nip that is missing throughout the summer. Football has started and the days are getting a little grayer and wetter. We still have plenty of sunny days at this time of year, but the cloudy ones are starting to creep in. These are great days to run in! Soon the trees will be ablaze in reds, yellows, and oranges and the air will have a smell of dying leaves that give it an earthy aroma. It is awesome to live in a place that has actual seasons.

 

Speaking of places that do not, Debbie has been in Southern California the past week taking a class for business. The house is really quiet and lonely with her gone and no more cats creeping around. I miss them, but that doesn’t mean we will be back in the pet realm anytime soon. I have heard word that Alex and Mo have a new kitty but I have only seen a picture of the little fuzz ball. They named it Dwight, after the Office character. I need to go and watch the first episode by the way. So………bye for now!!!