This has been Spring Break Week but it certainly wasn't what everyone expected. We've had a lot of precipitation which is normal. What isn't normal is the snow! Somehow a couple of nice cold low pressure systems moved into the area dropping a lot of moisture, snow above 500 feet, rain mixed with snow below that. There are a number of places between here and the coast, a favorite Spring Break getaway, that have had the roads shut down due to snow and ice. A lot of people staying a little longer than planned rather than risk an accident. The good part of it all is that it doesn't stay icy for long and the roads clear up in the afternoon. There is a window of opportunity for the travelers. This is a weather record for us: the latest measureable snowfall (at the airport) for this area. The previous record for the latest snow was March 8th some 57 years ago. It's interesting in a novel sort of way, but I wouldn't want it to be a regular occurrance, if you know what I mean.
It has been quiet at work, many people taking time off to supervise their children during the break. It's nice to have the more relaxed atmosphere for a while, a chance to concentrate for longer stretches on tasks you might not normally get to. I have windows right out side my cube so I have seen the snow these past several days. Thursday we even had dark cloud pass over and drop hail a little smaller than pea size for about five minutes or so. We could see it collecting on the lawn and roadway but it was gone ten minutes after the cloud moved on. The air may be quite cold but the ground is well above freezing. There is no chance that any snow or ice that makes it to our level (263 feet above sea level) is going to stick around for long.
So, the cold front is suppose to move on to the east early next week. It will warm up to the 50's but continue to rain for as long as the weathermen care to forecast. Last Saturday was a beautiful day, sunshiny and warm (50's). I had to mow the lawn as parts of it were starting to get out of hand. The cold seems to have pushed it back to the dormant stage, it hasn't growm much since then, thank goodness. Plenty of other things to do besides that.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Saturday, March 22, 2008
Spring Cleaning!
It’s been a quiet week in the neighborhood. I didn’t have any reason or excuse to take any part of Friday off and so worked a full five days this week. It was the first time in a long time. I fully expected to be contacted by the Red Cross for a platelet donation but then I guess they didn’t because it was Good Friday. It was also the first full day of spring and J S Bach’s birthday (323rd). I hope you celebrated all appropriately. There’s nothing like some Brandenburg Concerto in the morning to rev up your day.
The Spring Chinook Salmon season starts Monday on the Columbia River, for TWO weeks. That gives you some indication on how bad the runs are. The poor conditions for the past several years in a row are having a big impact on the number of fish returning this year, which in turn will affect the runs several years from now. It’s a viscous circle. Next week is Spring Break around here, so there are already a number of people taking off work. I expect that more than a few of them will find time to go down to the river and “wet a line”. R is still recovering from his surgery and is not suppose to lift more than 10 lbs which means he can’t take his boat out. He still has a couple of weeks before the tube comes out. Just thinking about that gives me the willies.
We are planning to do some(more) spring cleaning this weekend. There is a garage sale in our near future. The question is becoming where to stage the stuff for the garage sale while we clean up everything else. We recently received a large recycle bin from the garbage company. It couldn’t have come at a better time. We’ve been filling it with the years of stuff saved in the filing cabinet: manuals and paper work for toasters and lawn mowers and VHS players and old computers and what all that broke or was donated to some good cause years ago. We’ve been running the paper shredder a lot too. The ultimate purpose of all this is to clean out so we can downsize. This house is a lot of room for the two of us. There is just too much room for the dogs to mess up, that we have to constantly clean up. The cleaning up won’t change, it just would be nice if it was contained to a smaller area. I know, I know… good luck with that!
The Spring Chinook Salmon season starts Monday on the Columbia River, for TWO weeks. That gives you some indication on how bad the runs are. The poor conditions for the past several years in a row are having a big impact on the number of fish returning this year, which in turn will affect the runs several years from now. It’s a viscous circle. Next week is Spring Break around here, so there are already a number of people taking off work. I expect that more than a few of them will find time to go down to the river and “wet a line”. R is still recovering from his surgery and is not suppose to lift more than 10 lbs which means he can’t take his boat out. He still has a couple of weeks before the tube comes out. Just thinking about that gives me the willies.
We are planning to do some(more) spring cleaning this weekend. There is a garage sale in our near future. The question is becoming where to stage the stuff for the garage sale while we clean up everything else. We recently received a large recycle bin from the garbage company. It couldn’t have come at a better time. We’ve been filling it with the years of stuff saved in the filing cabinet: manuals and paper work for toasters and lawn mowers and VHS players and old computers and what all that broke or was donated to some good cause years ago. We’ve been running the paper shredder a lot too. The ultimate purpose of all this is to clean out so we can downsize. This house is a lot of room for the two of us. There is just too much room for the dogs to mess up, that we have to constantly clean up. The cleaning up won’t change, it just would be nice if it was contained to a smaller area. I know, I know… good luck with that!
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Spring Cleaning?
I am happy to report that R is recovering nicely from his kidney stonectomy, or whatever the official name for the procedure is. He’s still not supposed to lift more than 10 lbs, but he’s not letting that stop him from getting back into the swing of things. After all, he is a homeowner and it is the time of year for winter clean up/spring cleaning. We have a bit of that to do ourselves. P is planning to have a garage sale in several weeks. We have over 20 years of accumulation stored in the nooks and crannies of this house. There are lots of treasures for other people. We just have to figure out how much all these things are worth, sentimental more so than dollar-wise. When you have a garage sale you have to get it into your head that all the stuff is already gone, that you don’t want to have to put it back in storage again. You’ve already said your goodbyes to it all, it’s time for it to go…
The experts have closed the commercial salmon season from Washington all the way to California. A combination of circumstances over the past several years has reduced the salmon runs to very low numbers. The cost of salmon it going to go sky high. I’m not sure exactly what the effect will be on the sport fishing season. I’m sure R has his finger on that pulse, and he can’t be happy about it. I think they’ve stopped salmon fishing in the Willamette and severely restricted catching native salmon in the lower Columbia. I’m not sure what the limits are for hatchery salmon. I’m sure we’ll find out soon.
It’s time to get on with the events of the day. Hopefully I can get the dog’s walk in before the rains start today. It has been grey and raining off and on all week. With luck this little dry spell will hold until we get done. There’s nothing like the smell of wet dog all day long.
The experts have closed the commercial salmon season from Washington all the way to California. A combination of circumstances over the past several years has reduced the salmon runs to very low numbers. The cost of salmon it going to go sky high. I’m not sure exactly what the effect will be on the sport fishing season. I’m sure R has his finger on that pulse, and he can’t be happy about it. I think they’ve stopped salmon fishing in the Willamette and severely restricted catching native salmon in the lower Columbia. I’m not sure what the limits are for hatchery salmon. I’m sure we’ll find out soon.
It’s time to get on with the events of the day. Hopefully I can get the dog’s walk in before the rains start today. It has been grey and raining off and on all week. With luck this little dry spell will hold until we get done. There’s nothing like the smell of wet dog all day long.
Saturday, March 08, 2008
As Well As Can Be Expected
R’s surgery went well yesterday. He felt fine early last night when he got to his room. We’ll see how he feels this morning when the pain medication wears off. He could go home as soon as Sunday if all goes well.
The doctor said his kidney looked like a stone quarry. Apparently R’s Crones Disease predisposes him to kidney stones. It’s been 20 years since he’s had problems with kidney stones but this may be the reason for his recent back pains. They made a larger hole than his nephrostomy, higher up his back with a sheath to protect it from the tools, camera, light and stones. Apparently a lot of bacteria get released when you break up kidney stones. “Blast scoop and scrape” is how the doctor described it. They got them all, including the big one blocking his ureter. A tube was inserted down the ureter, from kidney to bladder, to keep it open while it recovers from the trauma of breaking up and removing the stone. R will experience some pain and “discomfort” from the tube according to the doctors. It will have to come out in a couple of weeks and when it does, it won't be the same way it went in. They will be pulling it down, out through the bladder and subsequent male plumbing. R is NOT looking forward to that! At least they removed the nephrostomy. No more tubes sticking out of his back. R is looking forward to having all this done with and things back to normal so he can get back to being retired. And going fishing!
After the doctor talked to us I drove out to R’s house, in rush hour traffic, to feed Gabby. A little later I packed her up with her blankie and drove across town back home. She was real happy to see Shakespeare and Bailey when I unloaded her. Shakespeare was beside himself: someone to play with! It took a couple hours for them to calm down enough to even think about going to bed. We put her crate next to Shakespeare’s cage. Normally she sleeps on the bed with R, not an option with us.
Bailey got up before 5 this morning and then came into to see what Shakespeare and Gabby were up doing and wake everyone up. I think Bailey saw the memo on Daylight Savings Time but misread the date as today instead of tomorrow. At any rate, we’ve been up for hours. We aren’t doing anything except supervising the dogs today, making sure they don’t tear the place down with their rough-housing. We will take the dogs for a walk in the park when the forecasted sunshine chases the clouds and rain away this afternoon. I don't think Gabby gets a lot of walks, just a lot of running around in the backyard. She can follow the others. It won't take long to get the hang of it, I'm sure.
Wish us luck!
The doctor said his kidney looked like a stone quarry. Apparently R’s Crones Disease predisposes him to kidney stones. It’s been 20 years since he’s had problems with kidney stones but this may be the reason for his recent back pains. They made a larger hole than his nephrostomy, higher up his back with a sheath to protect it from the tools, camera, light and stones. Apparently a lot of bacteria get released when you break up kidney stones. “Blast scoop and scrape” is how the doctor described it. They got them all, including the big one blocking his ureter. A tube was inserted down the ureter, from kidney to bladder, to keep it open while it recovers from the trauma of breaking up and removing the stone. R will experience some pain and “discomfort” from the tube according to the doctors. It will have to come out in a couple of weeks and when it does, it won't be the same way it went in. They will be pulling it down, out through the bladder and subsequent male plumbing. R is NOT looking forward to that! At least they removed the nephrostomy. No more tubes sticking out of his back. R is looking forward to having all this done with and things back to normal so he can get back to being retired. And going fishing!
After the doctor talked to us I drove out to R’s house, in rush hour traffic, to feed Gabby. A little later I packed her up with her blankie and drove across town back home. She was real happy to see Shakespeare and Bailey when I unloaded her. Shakespeare was beside himself: someone to play with! It took a couple hours for them to calm down enough to even think about going to bed. We put her crate next to Shakespeare’s cage. Normally she sleeps on the bed with R, not an option with us.
Bailey got up before 5 this morning and then came into to see what Shakespeare and Gabby were up doing and wake everyone up. I think Bailey saw the memo on Daylight Savings Time but misread the date as today instead of tomorrow. At any rate, we’ve been up for hours. We aren’t doing anything except supervising the dogs today, making sure they don’t tear the place down with their rough-housing. We will take the dogs for a walk in the park when the forecasted sunshine chases the clouds and rain away this afternoon. I don't think Gabby gets a lot of walks, just a lot of running around in the backyard. She can follow the others. It won't take long to get the hang of it, I'm sure.
Wish us luck!
Sunday, March 02, 2008
Way To Go Royals!
Last night Eric's cousin, Vance (Jody's sister's boy), a sophmore at Portland Christian High School, helped his team, the Royals, win the Oregon 2A State Basketball Championship!! (2A is schools with an average daily attendance of 116 to 235) The game was played in Pendleton Oregon. We listened to the radio broadcast on the computer. They beat Western Mennonite in convincing fashion: 70 to 38. The Royals led after the 1st quarter 22 to 2 and never looked back. It helped that they shot amost 70%, a very high percentage for a basketball game. Congratulations to Vance and the Royals!
The month of March is suppose to come in like a lion, go out like a lamb. Well yesterday we had some nice rain storms pass through the area, drenched us good. The weatherman said we might get some lightening and maybe even some hail. If so, it wasn't in our area. It actually cleared off in the afternoon and turned out to be a nice day. R and Gabby came over for a visit in the afternoon. Gabby and Shakespeare chased eachother to whole visit with short breaks for food, treats and naps. Bailey got in the action for a while but stayd on the sidelines and watched for the most part. It's hard to keep up with the energy of 11 month old dogs.
P changed the dressing on R's nephrostomy for the last time, his surgery is this Friday. He won't know exactly what time his surgery will be, morning or afternoon, until the day before. If it's in the afternoon we'll pick him up, take him to the hospital and wait for the results. If it's scheduled for the morning, P will go out the night before to take him first thing. I will take care of the morning routine around here and meet her at the hospital. The surgery is suppose to take up to four hours. They will go in throught the nephrostomy hole in his back, break up the stone, pull out the pieces and see what else needs to be done. Hopefully it will clear the ureter and his kidney will be able to function properly again. Once R is out of surgery and recovering, we will go back to his house to pick up Gabby. She's staying with us until R gets released from the hospital, up to four days depending on how quickly he recovers. It's going to be general mayhem around here until then! Wish us luck, all of us...
The month of March is suppose to come in like a lion, go out like a lamb. Well yesterday we had some nice rain storms pass through the area, drenched us good. The weatherman said we might get some lightening and maybe even some hail. If so, it wasn't in our area. It actually cleared off in the afternoon and turned out to be a nice day. R and Gabby came over for a visit in the afternoon. Gabby and Shakespeare chased eachother to whole visit with short breaks for food, treats and naps. Bailey got in the action for a while but stayd on the sidelines and watched for the most part. It's hard to keep up with the energy of 11 month old dogs.
P changed the dressing on R's nephrostomy for the last time, his surgery is this Friday. He won't know exactly what time his surgery will be, morning or afternoon, until the day before. If it's in the afternoon we'll pick him up, take him to the hospital and wait for the results. If it's scheduled for the morning, P will go out the night before to take him first thing. I will take care of the morning routine around here and meet her at the hospital. The surgery is suppose to take up to four hours. They will go in throught the nephrostomy hole in his back, break up the stone, pull out the pieces and see what else needs to be done. Hopefully it will clear the ureter and his kidney will be able to function properly again. Once R is out of surgery and recovering, we will go back to his house to pick up Gabby. She's staying with us until R gets released from the hospital, up to four days depending on how quickly he recovers. It's going to be general mayhem around here until then! Wish us luck, all of us...
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