A Second Anniversary

Memorial Day will never roll around without me being reminded of my DVT/PE incident in 2017.  Though it has been two years I am just now wrapping up with all the "ologists" I gained on that day.  I saw the GYN this week and have scheduled a mammogram, both routine annual things.

In June I will have another ultrasound on my leg to see what is what with my historically long DVT.  I have no pain or swelling. I have successfully flown to Rome and Hawaii over the last year.  So I am expecting to get discharged from the cardiologist who said my heart was not damaged at all.  There was talk of collapsing a vein with leaky valves but that could cause a clot so I am leaving well enough alone on the advice of my hematologist and PCP.  They all agree I will need to stay on Eliquis for life since no reason was determined for causing the DVT.  I tolerate it well with no unusual bruising, and small cuts and needle sticks do not bleed more than normal

So in the words of Dr. C, I am doing great!

Friday night we had dinner in a restaurant with four other couples and then went to one of the couple's home to play cards.  Another loss!  I can't beg, steal or borrow a card when I need it.  I had ONE Joker all night.  Maybe I am just not good at cards, but it is fun to play.

After Mass on Saturday, though Terry and Carol were there, we had all decided we wouldn't go out to eat.  There is such a thing as too much of a good thing.  We came home to a simple dinner and stayed in.

We are starting to plan for our end of June departure to Nashville/KY/OH/MI/IN and where we are going in August.  We have three people in MT who want us to come out there and two in Nebraska.  But before that I have to think about serving dinner and breakfast to about 100 people at the family reunion.  It also is likely we will join the DOGs (DRV Owners Group) in Hot Springs in September and then travel with Tommy and Susan to Foley, AL in October.  Leaving there we will continue on to San Antonio for the Sporting Clay Nationals the next week.  The RV will get a rest as we travel to Ireland in early November with all Ted's siblings only to return and fly to Michigan for Thanksgiving.  By then we will be looking forward to Mission, TX where we will stay put until mid-March!  Whew!  

The rest of the week was quiet and Memorial Day weekend looked as if it would be the same.  I considered having folks over but many were out of town.  After Mass on Saturday we went to dinner with Terry and Carol and they invited us for dinner on Sunday.  While Ted and Pete went to the Houston Gun Club I made some peanut butter cookies and a fruit salad to take to dinner.  I sent Pete home with some cookies, set a few aside for Ted and packaged up the rest so I wouldn't be tempted!  

We had a delicious steak dinner and then played cards.  I was in first place until the last hand.  There was a card I needed but Carol drew a card without asking if anyone wanted to buy the discard.  I thought she had just picked up the discard.  When I saw it still sitting there I started to say something but she can't hear well and trying to undo what had transpired wasn't worth it so I said let it go and lost!

In the meantime we were invited to Barry and Gerre's pool party on Memorial Day.  Their grandson was not playing ball as expected so they put together an impromptu party.  Again a fruit salad was requested so I just made another one!

Behind Again

The trouble with falling behind is it is so hard to remember what I did!  The end of last week was busy.  That is my excuse and I am sticking to it.

I saw Dr. C on Thursday.  He ordered the thyroid panel requested by Dr. W, called in a script for my Eliquis at the request of Dr. P, ordered my refill of cholesterol meds, looked over my two week table of BPs I compiled and proclaimed them beautiful and no need for meds. I left there and went directly to the lab.  Bottom line, no problem with thyroid, cholesterol was 163, so I have 6 months of my two pills and an appointment for the last day in October.  Also, the Cologuard was negative.  I am good, for awhile anyway.

From there I attended our neighborhood ladies luncheon.  Eight ladies attended but we had no birthdays!

While driving home from Florida, my car windshield received a third ding and we developed a six inch crack that made a turn south and kept on for another two inches.  So Friday morning Ted made a trip to Safelight for a replacement.  There certainly is a lot involved in the windshield technology not to mention the several stickers needing to be removed and replaced.  But it went well.

That evening we met Jennifer, Gene, Gerre and Barry at the theater to see “Happy Days.”  The singing by the younger folks was a bit weak but Mrs. Cunningham and the Fonz stole the show.

We were scheduled to have our Couples Shanghai group on Saturday but only three other couples could make it.  So we played four men in the dining room and four women in the kitchen.  I lost!  We had prepared the snacks and managed to go to church at 5:00 and were ready by 7:00.

It was a Cards week for me.  The Canasta group, 12 in all, came to our house for three tables of four each to play.  I had really good cards, scored well but still came in third!  Another $1 gambled away.

Still not done, I went to the 3-13 card game at a local restaurant.  There were about 30 Newcomer members playing.  I was at a table of 5 knowing only one of the other four ladies.  I was in the lead until after lunch when I couldn’t do diddly squat.  So I went three for three in cards!

I colored my hair Thursday and then had it cut.  I wish I had pretty all gray or white hair but I only get salt and pepper mousey brown!  Here’s to Lady Clairol.

Our Installation lunch for Forum was on Thursday at the Conference Center.  It is a time when all the members come together, everyone dresses up and a lot is accomplished.  We recognize the outgoing president, Executive Board, Board of Directors, Volunteer of the The Year and a tip of the hat to everyone that was nominated as Volunteer of the Month throughout the year.  The Provisionals are elevated to Active members and 31 new Provisionals were introduced for this year.  Then we have lunch!

The program was a salute to all the hats our new president will wear.  

My Happy Place

Finally I was able to join my Forum Friends at one of our Senior Luncheons.  It has been a long time since I have been home long enough to do any volunteer work.  The theme was Summer at the Beach.  I didn’t purchase any bingo prizes recently so I used a small pink and white tin bucket, rolled up two solid colored dish towels and stood them on end and added a tube of skin cream.  I never thought about it but folks remarked it was such a great “theme” gift!  I also took a pound bag of coffee.  My tin bucket was taken right off the bat and there were several packages of coffee and I didn’t pay close attention to it.

Our entertainer had a great voice and sang terrific songs about sun, beaches, travels, etc.  He had an aloha shirt on and kept changing his hat or wig and was most enjoyable.  The Seniors enjoyed him for sure.  Carol introduced him wearing her beach wear.  A couple Forum friends and a Senior had the same thought on beachwear!  

Lunch was chicken salad, pasta salad, fruit salad, roll and a cupcake.  Our kitchen crew did a great job feeding the 200 Seniors.

So Close Yet So Far

We were up and out by 8 am Saturday morning and drove all the way to Lafayette before stopping for the night.  We stopped for lunch at a cute train themed restaurant and took a few photos. The first is a true dining car.  The second is a table attached to a specially painted wall that is the back of a pick up.  The rear window is actually a movie screen.  We sat at a regular table that was a shallow case covered by glass with lots of interesting train things inside.  The food was surpringly good!

We stopped in Baton Rouge and attended Mass at a mostly black church.  We were greeted and given rosaries as we entered and there was no hiding the fact that we were visitors when asked to stand.  It was such a warm and welcoming congregation and the music was terrific.  So many came up to thank us for coming to worship with them and we were given a prayer book for the Easter season though it is ending shortly.  What a bit of serendipity to our trip.

Much to our chagrin the Crawfish Festival was being held in Lafayette and motels were full!  We finally drove to the western edge before finding a room.  It was fine and we found four beers in the refrigerator so brought those orphans home with us

We were up early, way ahead of the crawfish revelers, but the coffee decanters were already empty. So were the syrup pitchers for the waffles.  I ate some Raisin Bran and Ted had waffles with jelly on them.  By the time we were done more coffee finally came out.  The late sleeping crowd may have been in for a rude awakening to go with their hangovers.

We made it home by early afternoon and put things away, and then our feet up.

We had talked to Scott the salesman in Winter Garden and made an offer on the light colored motorhome.  You can see they are the same but with different coloring.  It is a used 2016 versus a new 2018 that is about to turn two years old anyway, the price difference was $35,000 and I would rather someone else deal with that depreciation because there is more to come.

We got to $9,000 apart and didn’t commit, but once we got home I sent photos of other Mobile Suites for sale and included mention of the $4,000 of new furniture and the new Temperpedic mattress we put in last year and they came around until we were $5,000 and we said yes.

In the meantime we went to a dealer here and Ted drove one to be sure he was comfortable.  He said it is amazingly easy with the tag axle and articulating back wheels.  Ted asked Scott for the name and number of the previous owner and talked to him.  He gave it a big thumbs up, a lot of tips on use and driving but said it needed its yearly maintenance he had not done when he traded it 2.5 weeks ago.  This is about a $1,000 service and should be done and the fuel tank filled when a unit is sold or at least that is what we have encountered.  Scott said no, we would have to pay the $1,000.  Ted asked about their cost to do it and he said $1,000. That would mean those services owners use each year are doing it for nothing!  It was downhill from there.  They were pressing us for a deposit while I was waiting for them to tell me how to transmit it.  They weren’t happy about us not being able to drive our truck and trailer over for 10 days, etc. We were feeling rushed.

We have a very busy two weeks and I agreed to skip one thing so we could leave next Tuesday instead of next Friday, I told them I could easily charge a deposit over the phone but with the stipulation it was refundable based on a test drive.  We even checked into Ted flying over this week to test drive it and do the PDI on it but our things could not get there any sooner.  Finally we agreed we didn’t want to buy in haste and repent at leisure and called the deal off.  They immediately changed the price on the website to $5,000 less!!  And they lost a sale over $1,000 service that wouldn’t cost them that much and a week’s time.

Just Sunnin’

We spent time in the pool Sunday before heading to DeBary where we lived from 1996-2001.  My cousin and his wife have recently moved to the area and we took this opportunity to have dinner and a visit with them.  They are really enjoying this cute St. John’s River town  more than their “middle of the state” home and I am glad for them.

We had located an RV dealership in Leesburg, near The Villages where we owned rental property from 1994-2006.  We actually lived there for six months building our DeBary home in addition to spending many vacations over those years while we still lived in Michigan.  The two RVs we looked at didn’t float our boat.  My biggest hang up is the furniture placement in most, one of the reasons I like the Meridian best so far.  However, this one was blah and the Entegra had two recliners facing the couch necessitating you having to look right to the front or left to the back to watch TV, a common problem.  When you spend months in one, that would get old for me quickly.  So we ate an early dinner and came back to Winter Springs.

A trip to New Smyrna Beach on Tuesday allowed us to meet up with Tom and Eileen.  We all lived in DeBary together and shortly after we left they moved to Palm Coast. NSB was a good half way point for all of us and gave us a glimpse of the ocean.  Parking at the beach is $20!  Tom and Eileen will spend January in Mission with us once again next year.

Still scouring the internet we found a dealer in Winter Gardens and headed that way on Wednesday.  The Meridian was okay but the wall covering was sort of green/gold and rather dark.  There really isn’t much of it exposed except in the bedroom where a full length mirror and a large picture would make it less noticeable.  Then we looked at Newmar Ventanas.  I found one that had two recliners facing a couch BUT the TV comes up from behind the couch so you can sit in the recliners to watch.  In the event I wanted to lay on the couch I could watch the TV in the front above the cab.

Today we head to Gainesville and settle into the AirBnB Larry rented for our stay while he has surgery.  Ted is “pondering” the motorhome thing so we may or may not stop to revisit this particular decision.

We stopped again at the RV dealer to give them info on our truck and trailer.  They were having an appreciation luncheon for winning some awards and invited us to join them.  We were going to stop for lunch so why not?

We found a brand new RV that is the same layout but with darker wood that we liked better.

We gave them our info, we looked at several others but indicated we liked this one best.  I explained we were dealing with this surgery in Gainesville for Larry, needed to return to Texas for doctors, social engagements, volunteer things, etc. but also needed to leave on a 6 week trip the third week in June either in our existing set up or a new motorhome.  He didn’t give us any figures beyond the coach price.  Ted said he could drive the truck and trailer over in two days once we get things settled at home.  So we continued on our way.  Today when I looked on the website it said Sale Pending.  Not sure if it really is or they are trying to force our hand!  

We went to Four Rivers BBQ for dinner and came home ready for bed,

Up at 5:30 am we headed to Shands hospital and Larry had his “folded over, filled with sludge gall bladder” removed Friday morning and came home shortly thereafter.  He is doing okay so we will be heading for home tomorrow spending one night on the road.