Counting Posts

Since I started this blog in 2010, I've tried to post something every day.  It hasn't worked - it ain't easy to find something profound, clever, or even slightly interesting to write about every day.

For some reason, June seems to be the hardest month to find my voice.  This is only the ninth post this month, and I haven't posted every day in June since 2015. 

At least this year is better than 2017, a month in which I only managed five posts for the entire month!
The ones I did post were pretty good, and one of them has one of my all-time favorite quotes -  I was talking on an RV website about an odor Honey was complaining about - something I couldn't smell at all.  

I got several replies, but The best of them was not necessarily helpful - a guy from Pennsylvania said, "Good luck with that.  My wife can smell things over the phone that I can't smell right under my nose."

Must Be Jelly

On one of my last trips to the grocery store, I bought a jar of apricot preserves, and at breakfast  the other day  I opened them.  They tasted fine, but my immediate reaction was "That's not preserves, it's jam."  

That put me on an internet search for the definitions and differences between fruit spreads.  Here's what I found:

• Preserves - fruit, whole or chunks, boiled in sugar water with no jelling agent added.
• Jam - juice or pureed fruit with or without pectin added.
• Jelly - juice with pectin (possibly gelatin) added as a jelling agent.
• Marmalade - basically preserves with the rind added.

I guess the bottom line, though, is if you make it and your name is on the label, you can call it anything you want.

My Excuse

I haven't posted much on my blog for the last week or so.  I had reasons - disappointed about not being able to take our trip due to problems with the 5th wheel, etc. - but now I have an EXCUSE!

It all started Monday night after supper.  I got the most excruciating pain in my stomach, pain that radiated into my back.  It was bad enough that I ended up sleeping (what little sleeping I did) on the recliner for two nights in a row.

It continued to bother me, so I went to the doctor on Thursday.  By the time I got to see him, it seemed a little better, but he ordered some blood tests, and yesterday afternoon his office called. "You have pancreatitis, and need to go to the ER."

After several hours, more blood tests and a CAT scan, the hospital confirmed the diagnosis.  The doctor did seem to think that it was getting better, and he let me come home.  

Treatment at this point is a bland diet, small portions, and a long list of foods to avoid - no alcohol, no caffeine, no bacon, no fun.  

I still have some more diagnostics scheduled for next week, and another doctor's appointment, but maybe we're on the downhill side of this.

Anyway, if you've never had pancreatitis, don't. 

You Can Find ANYTHING On The Internet

You can find anything on the internet - anything at all - whether you want to or not.

A few days ago, while taking my pills, I noticed one in my aspirin bottle that was white and round but much smaller than the others.  It had a strange squiggle on one side and the numbers 3973 on the other.

I did an on-line search and discovered that the squiggle was a cursive V and the pill was Lisinopril, one of the meds I take every day.  I didn't recognise it because the Lisinopril I take now is much smaller and orange. I haven't taken the white pill like the one in the aspirin bottle in over a year, and I still have no idea how it got in there.

Sometimes, you don't even have to search - things will find you. I recently opened an email from someone I thought was a former student.  I know this is a dangerous thing to do, but I was sure I knew the sender.

I guess I got lucky it wasn't some kind of malware virus.

It turned out to be a link to a video of a young woman engaged in a sex act with a TIGER! Yep, a real live, honest to God, Bengal freakin tiger.

Now that's something I would never have imagined.  Something I would not have believed possible, and something you just can't un-see.

Best Laid - continued

WE should have been traveling from Kentucky into Ohio today.
Instead, I got a haircut and went grocery shopping.

Best Laid Plans

About this time today, we should have been somewhere in Arkansas on the second day of a trip to Ohio.  Instead, our trailer is in the shop, and the most exciting thing on my schedule is possibly mowing the yard.

It ain't perfect, but life is still good, 

Reunion

Our daughter, Cheryl, is in town for a 30th high school reunion this weekend - just one more reason to feel old...

Birthday Remembrance

“My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light!”

― Edna St. Vincent Millay, A Few Figs from Thistles

Remembering our daughter, Shanna Leigh Couch Robinson,

June 5, 1973- February 15, 2006.

A life well lived, but much too short.  We miss you every day.

Bummed Out 2

Should get the new fridge installed in the 5th wheel today, then we'll see what has to be done with that other problem I found.
We may have changed our minds about selling it.  I guess that remains to be seen, too.