This week the county reports 339 new cases of Covid for a total of 88,961. There have been no new deaths. Whoopee! However, the rate of new cases per 100K population has gone up 9.7 to 35.7. It appears that rate no sooner went way down than it began climbing again.
Last week, I unexpectedly got an invitation from my sister-in-law, who had won a few days’ stay in a Gearhart beach house, to come to the beach. So, on Wednesday morning, my sister and I were off to the beach! (Wayne got invited, too, of course, but he did not choose to go, as usual.) It was raining all the way there and rained most of the first day until mid-afternoon, but that’s the weather at the coast.
The house was an old one, built in the early 20th century, and it was huge! It was also nicely turned out and well equipped. There were five bedrooms with sleeping for up to 17, although two of those rooms were a tiny back bedroom on the ground floor with two really uncomfortable twin beds and not much room for anything else (where my sister and I ended up) and a huge room with four bunk beds in it. If everyone had come who was invited, it may have been difficult to cram them all in, but as it was, it was perfectly comfortable (except for my mattress).
Here is a three-quarter view of the house. The front door is to the right. There is only one house in between it and the dunes to the beach.
The downstairs of the house had a huge living room with a fireplace and behind it a TV room and a dining room with a massive oak table and benches, then a moderately sized kitchen with the laundry machines in a room on the way out the back door, and our little bedroom tucked in the corner with a half bath. I understand there was also a really creepy basement below, but I didn’t go down.
Sunset on the beach
Upstairs, there were four huge bedrooms, one in each corner, and the one our hosts picked had a lovely view of the ocean through windows on two sides. Two of the bedrooms were en suite, and one, oddly, had a sink in it. In the middle of the hall, there was also a full bathroom.
A view from partway up the Clatsop Loop Trail
We had some fun times. My niece and her family arrived for the day shortly after we did. My brother and his wife came over from Seaside, and they had dinner with us and a beach walk on the first day. The next day, an old friend of my sister-in-law’s appeared, having driven with her daughter from Bend. They got to sleep in the bunk bed room. That day was rainy in the morning and clear in the afternoon. My brother came over again, and we all went for a hike in Ecola Park in Cannon Beach. On the way out, it was all uphill and very muddy. Unfortunately, I didn’t bring my hiking books, so I got a soaker. I also wasn’t sure at one point that I was going to make it up. It is difficult for me when I don’t know how far I have to go. But my youngest brother stayed with me the whole time and was very patient, and he went ahead to see how far it was when I was flagging and told me I was almost there. So, I made it to where everyone stopped, where there was a view of Tillamook Lighthouse (Terrible Tilly) through a gap in the bushes. Then we all went back down, and that time my other brother stayed with me, as I am slow. It wasn’t a long hike for some of them, but at least we all got some exercise and fresh air.
Terrible Tilly, way out in the middle of the photo, and looking calm. But she isn’t always!
In the evenings we had lots of good food and talk.
The next morning my sister and I were up before most of the others, so we went down to the beach. When we got back, the others were starting to get up, and we were already packed, so we said our goodbyes and then went out to breakfast at Pig and Pancake before starting home.
We got back mid-afternoon Friday. Of course, our nicest day weather-wise was Friday, and it was nice at home, too, but I was tired from the trip and accomplished exactly nothing the rest of the day.
On Saturday I got up early to go to tai chi, but I was so tired from not getting much sleep (staying up way past my bedtime and then there was the bed, which I felt like I was sliding off of) that I realized I wouldn’t be able to concentrate. I stayed home, and even though it was a nice day, I ended up sleeping almost all afternoon.
Sunday, too, was nice, although not as nice as the preceding two days, and it was warmer, the first day we didn’t need a jacket, but it was partly cloudy. I finally got outside and prepared my vegetable beds for planting. Wayne helped me with the new bags of dirt, but I also want to put more dirt into my flower beds, and we ran out. So, we’ll have to do that after later.
Monday things turned colder and back to rain, and on Tuesday afternoon, just after I brought Luke in from his walk, it started hailing like crazy outside. In fact, we turned around midway because it suddenly got very cold, and I could tell another front was coming in.
I managed to attend my exercise class on Tuesday, when Maja told me that she was going to quit tai chi. She has been driving into Portland on the weeks when her Saturdays are filled, and she said it was just too long a trip and she was struggling too much to know what to do. I did notice at our last class that she seemed to be having more difficulty than I was, and I don’t have a clue what’s going on half the time. I will be happy when they restart their beginner’s classes, and I hope they have one in Battle Ground. Then maybe she’ll go again.
The county reports the total number of Covid cases up 866 this week, for a total of 84,482. Of these, 907 cases are confirmed? (the question mark is because it’s more than the total increase) but the number of probable cases has gone down by 41. There have been 14 more deaths, for a total of 754. Our rate of new cases per 100K population is getting much closer to the desired number of last summer (which was 100). It has gone down 260 to 267.4.
Here’s Luke on the Tarbell Trail. He goes on up ahead of me, but then he always comes back to see how I am. This is him coming back to me.
The hallmark of last week was a hike on Sunday with my family. Whereas for a while there, I was hiking almost every week, I have only gone on one or two hikes since I got plantar fasciitis last summer, so I am out of shape. We did a hike of three miles that normally wouldn’t have been difficult at all for me, but just about wore me out. Because we were going to leave one car at the end of the hike and all drive up to the beginning, I was at first asked to leave Luke home, because my niece is allergic to dogs and they didn’t want pet dander in her car. However, I was thinking of backing out, because Luke hadn’t had much exercise over the two days before because when it rains he doesn’t want to go out. Wayne finally said that he would go with us, drive me and Luke up to the top and then go to the bottom and wait for us. That’s what we did, and a sweet thing of Wayne to offer.
So, we left a car at Rock Creek Campground in Yacolt Burn State Forest and drove up to the Tarbell trailhead. The hike was mostly downhill and it was a nice day for a change, sunny with a few clouds, and cold at the beginning. I hadn’t been on that part of the Tarbell trail before. It went over several streams and also had some nice views. However, toward the end I got very tired, especially through an area where mountain bikers had cut the trail into a deep but narrow groove, so that footing was difficult. I get stumblefoot when I am tired, which didn’t help. All-in-all, I had a good time, but I was very achy the next day (as were some other members of the party) and even on Tuesday decided to skip exercise class. By Tuesday afternoon, I was feeling fine, though.
I wasn’t the only one pooped out from the hike. That evening Luke conked right out on the floor and hardly moved until bedtime. He always gets about three times more exercise than I do, because he runs ahead down the trail, usually a bit ahead of the others who are with me (I’m always way back at the end, although my niece’s husband and my great nephew kindly stayed back with me through the whole hike), and then he periodically runs back to see if I’m okay or to get a drink of water or beg for a treat, and then he runs up ahead again.
Actually, this week was quite unusual, because Wayne and I went to Crab Feast at the Northwood Pub in Battle Ground on Saturday. It was quite crowded, so we had to wait for a half hour to get in. Wayne was irritated because while we were waiting a guy was sitting across from him gassing away without a mask. When some other people were seated, we moved down the long bench we were sitting on to get away from him.
Once we were seated, I ordered half a crab, but the wait person must have misheard me, because I got a whole one, as did Wayne. I was able to eat it, though. I have never eaten a whole crab before. Our wait person told us they were probably going to run out of crab before dinner, even though they had purchased 100 pounds more than last year, so we were glad we went in the middle of the afternoon.
Luke and I were also supposed to go to Christine’s on Friday, but she cancelled because she wasn’t feeling well. It would have been quite the festive week if we had seen her, too.
Aside from those things, I just had my normal classes during the week. The guy who made the fuss in art class last week was perfectly quiet this week and just worked on his projects.
I have seen some signs of spring this week. My bulbs have been pushing up leaves for some time, but the other day, I went down to the orchard and saw about half a dozen snowdrops and one crocus up. I took photos, but the flowers are so small, and in the grass they look quite insignificant. No sign of the bluebells I planted in the shade, although Wayne did his best to remove that area of woods from between our house and the orchard, in the process cutting down a flowering tree that had been showing its pretty red flowers every spring. In fact, he cleared it out so much that there may not be enough shade for bluebells to flourish.
We have also had several sightings of ducks in the pond, although not consistently enough to think any have settled there this year. They seem to be in transit.
The weather was rainy most of the week until the weekend, when it cleared up beautifully. But Monday it started raining again until this morning. We were actually told we might have snow this morning when we awakened, but we did not. And the daytime temperature is supposed to be in the high 40’s or low 50’s.
This week the county reports the number of Covid cases up 811 for a total of 47,506, 747 of which are confirmed cases. The number of active cases is up 184, and there have been 9 new deaths. Our rate of new cases per 100K population has gone down 10.4, though.
I spent the end of last week getting ready for Christmas. My brother and his wife actually arrived a day earlier than we expected, on Thursday, so they came over that night to watch a movie I had recorded for Christmas, Mon Oncle Antoine. It takes place at Christmas but is actually a bit of a downer, so not exactly a great choice for a Christmas movie, although a good movie overall. Lucie had worked with the director and one of the actresses, as it was a French-Canadian movie. It was nice to see the two of them before Christmas, even though I didn’t really get to watch a suitable Christmas movie on Christmas Eve, as I usually do.
On Friday I varnished the painting that I gave them last summer, and which they brought back to be varnished. Aside from cleaning the bathrooms and doing laundry, all I did besides that was read and listen to Christmas music.
On Friday night I roasted a chicken for dinner, and then we started looking for something Christmassy to watch. I hoped to talk Wayne into A Pocketful of Miracles, which I had recorded for my Christmas movie, but just as I was going to ask him to watch it, he accidentally deleted it instead of the news. (Anyway, he usually goes to bed when I watch my Christmas movie.) So, we looked for something on Netflix, but the choice wasn’t great. We ended up watching a Shaun the Sheep Christmas movie, but it wasn’t that good. It was more like an American kid’s movie than we have been accustomed to seeing from that studio. (We love Wallace and Gromit.) Wayne went away in the middle of it.
Christmas morning was a mixed bag. Wayne has notoriously been a poor present giver, and it’s a good thing I picked out a nice sweater for myself and told him to buy it, because the rest of my gifts were not ones I wanted. They were all the same type of gift, and what I can say about them is they were things I dislike getting that he gets for me every few years for some reason. That’s all I’m going to say. I got him several books and DVDs I knew he would like as well as some undershirts and a new wallet. We have already watched all the episodes on the Jack Irish DVD, and he is reading one of the books.
My niece wanted us to come over in the late morning/early afternoon to exchange gifts. It was kind of hard to get Wayne going. I had everything ready and Luke in the crate, and as I was picking up my purse, he decided to go out and feed the birds. But we finally got there, just as they were about to depart to walk over to our house. We had a fun few hours, and then I had to go home to make scalloped potatoes as my share of the Christmas dinner.
I was a bit late with them, because they are supposed to be almost dry when they are done. My oven seems to cook low at lower temperatures and high at higher ones, so even though I put the temperature up a bit from the recipe, they weren’t quite done by 5 PM, and everyone had been over there since 4:20. I finally gave up and took them over a little soupy, but they were very popular. They were slightly al dente, which they’re not supposed to be, but everyone liked them.
Here’s my little blue spruce on Sunday night, after a night and day of snow.
We had a nice Christmas night and went home around 7:30 because Luke had been in the slammer almost all day. It had been fitfully snowing and raining for two days with no accumulation since last Monday, which had melted off, but it started snowing in earnest that night and has been snowing ever since. Right now we have about four or five inches. Everything looks really beautiful.
The same blue spruce the next morning with a little more snow. You can see the background better in this photo and how much the trees filled with snow.
On Sunday it snowed all day. Luke and I walked over to Katrina’s house on Sunday morning, only to find my sister, brother, and sister-in-law on the way out to go for a walk at Moulton Falls Park. To join them, Luke and I walked home and then got right into the car. My sister had told me they would start from the upper lot, but when I got there, it was closed, so I went to the next lot right around the corner and thought I had parked next to her car. However, about a mile into the park, I got a text from them saying they were at the Hantwick entrance, clear across the park. Since I had been walked already for about a mile, I decided to keep going, and we met midway. My sister and sister-in-law decided to go back, but my brother walked along with me back to my car. The park was really beautiful, but unfortunately, my phone died as I was attempting to take a picture of it. I ended up covered in snow and found out that my winter jacket isn’t waterproof. When I got home, I had to change almost all my clothes.
My fuchia plant still alive, with icicles. The snow at the front of the deck is about five inches deep.
We had a really interesting drive home, too. The roads were bad but no challenge for either of our Subarus. However, on the way out, we passed a truck in a ditch and an SUV crammed up against the railroad track. It’s a good thing not many trains come up that way. On the way back, we were halfway to Yacolt when we encountered a big accident and had to turn around. The rural roads around our house make a big loop, so we just went the other way. When we got back to the park, there was a car in the ditch there and another one blocking our lane that had either been hit by it or was trying to help it. It was hard to say which. We had to drive around them on the wrong side of the road. Then I was surprised when my sister, who was driving the lead car, chose to go over Yacolt Mountain instead of the longer way out to the highway and back into our area on other, more traveled roads. The road up the mountain has lots of twists and turns and two 90-degree turns at the top. But we were fine driving about 25 miles an hour. We got home around 2:30.
On Monday I was hanging around the house while Wayne drove into Vancouver for an eye appointment when my brother asked if I wanted to come over and watch a movie with them. I did but was unable to walk because I had some chafing from the walk the day before. But my brother kindly offered to clear off his car and come get me. So, I spent a couple of hours with them watching the movie and then my sister drove me home.
On Tuesday I was home reading when my sister-in-law dropped by. It was still snowing, so we had even more snow, and she was out for a walk with my sister. She visited with us for about a half hour and then walked back. It’s nice to have visitors. Later that day I finally watched A Pocketful of Miracles on DVD.
It’s been really nice having these quiet days with all the snow. My exercise class was canceled on Tuesday (I skipped it last week so that I could clean the house), and I canceled out of my Monday art class because of the conflict with Wayne’s eye appointment, although they told me that they would probably close that evening anyway. Another storm was supposed to come in Monday night, and I’m not sure if it did, but it certainly kept snowing, although the flakes became very small on Tuesday. Luke didn’t seem to react much to the snow until Tuesday morning, when about five inches of it were on the ground, and then he tore around like an idiot. He loves snow. This morning it is still snowing a little bit.
This week the county reports the total number of cases up 719 to 44,669. 573 of those are confirmed and 146 probable. Number of active cases is down 59, but number of deaths is up 12 for a total of 538. The rate of new cases per 100K population, which I don’t report very often, is still 279.1, but that is down 26.6 from last week.
On Wednesday of last week, I was busy baking. I made two pumpkin pies for the holidays, although I wasn’t sure whether to take one over to my niece’s house or not. I also put together two meatloafs (because my veal was frozen in a one-pound container, which is enough for two), one for dinner that night and one to freeze. My brother and his wife arrived in the late afternoon. We got them settled and had dinner. During this we had a laugh, because the week before I misread a text from Lucie that said, I thought, that my nephew Will was coming here for Thanksgiving. Actually, she was saying what time they would arrive (Will arrive . . ., which I read as Will arrives), and I actually got a room ready for Will and sent him a text (he must have thought I lost my marbles) before realizing that she knew nothing about him coming for the holidays. So, that made a big laugh during the holidays, since it got repeated to everyone. We stayed up very late, for us, that night talking.
We also had a discussion about whether to bring the pie, since my niece always makes pie for the holidays so no one has ever tasted my pumpkin pie, and about when to cook the turkey. Wayne and I always make one, even if we’re spending Thanksgiving away, so that we have turkey for sandwiches. John was pushing for turkey sandwiches, too, so I made the turkey Thanksgiving morning. When John and Lucie were ready to go over to Katrina’s in the early afternoon, Luke and I went along, but then we left them there and came back to make my dish, squash casserole, and relax a while before going over closer to dinner time.
Most of the family was at my niece’s house, even her husband’s mother, Shawn, whom we hadn’t seen for years because of the virus. She and her husband moved to Utah a couple years ago. She was supposed to come back to do several substitute teaching gigs at the local elementary school, but Covid arrived. A good time was had by all. As could have been predicted, Wayne left early to feed Luke. I called him to pick me up a while later, and when he didn’t arrive as soon as I expected, I yelled back to everyone that he would probably come about the time that Will arrived. That got a big laugh. Wayne and I relaxed in the living room for several hours (I was beat from all the cooking) before John and Lucie arrived back.
Here is the family except for Ares, who took the picture. I am way in the back on the couch with my great niece.
Friday morning we decided to have turkey sandwiches and pumpkin pie for breakfast because a family hike was planned for 1 PM. John came up at 9 and said that my sister wanted to change the hike from 1 PM to 11 AM, but Lucie had a bad night and wasn’t up yet. We ended up keeping the 1 PM time, but by the time we went, the rainy weather discouraged everyone except me, Luke, John, Lucie, and Sue.
Sue took us to the new trailhead for the Siouxon Trail. I had been down that trail before with little difficulty except that the end approach is uphill for quite a way. However, they moved the trailhead because of the fires last year. This new trailhead goes downhill for quite a bit longer, almost two miles. My muscles were protesting already since I hadn’t done a real hike in a long time when Lucie (who nicely waited for me, the slow hiker) and I came up with John and Sue. Sue began encouraging me to go back up, telling me that it took her 1 1/2 hours to get back up from the bottom a few weeks ago. We hadn’t been going down that long, so I felt weird about going back, but Lucie told me she would go ahead a few hundred more feet, then turn around and catch up with me. So, Luke and I started back up, stopping fairly frequently. However, when Lucie caught up with me, she said I had made a lot more progress than she expected.
The Siouxan Trail. When I took this picture, I was just going to turn around and go back the other way. Everyone else had already gone forward and was out of the picture. The trail is fairly flat here but is about to go down again.
She had actually made it to the top and was waiting for me a few yards behind when John came huffing up the trail at a good pace. I moved aside to let him by but soon wished I hadn’t, because we learned that Sue had challenged him to beat us up to the top. We didn’t know about the race, however, so he beat me. I wouldn’t have let him go by if I’d realized we were racing, because I was almost up myself, and we both would have beat him. Then he and Lucie raced each other and got to the cars at the same time. By the time I got to the top, I had no interest in racing. I asked John how long he thought Sue would take to come up and he said about 1/2 hour, that he would go back down for her if she wasn’t up by then. They didn’t mind if we left, since we were all sopping wet, so Luke and I went home. They told me later that Sue arrived about 20 minutes later.
On Saturday after John and Lucie left to go back home, Wayne and I went out to look for a Christmas tree. There have been shortages around here for the last few years, and because most of the people around here buy their trees at U Cuts, there aren’t as many available in lots. We stopped buying the U Cut trees three years ago when we realized that someone else was going to have to cut our tree for us since we can’t get down on the ground. The last two years we have purchased our tree from a dealer in Battle Ground, but this year, I took one look at his trees and saw that all the big ones were really wispy. So, we drove to Bizi Farms, which had a few big trees, although they are not as full as my usual. So, my tree is nice, but although it is as tall as the tallest I’ve had, it is only about half the width. The Bizi Farms girls trimmed it for us and put it in the net, which is more than the guy in BG ever did, so I think we’ll go back there from now on. Also, the trees were a bit cheaper.
After it took us an hour or so struggling with the stand to get it up, I was done for the day. I didn’t do anything else, including the dishes that were left over from the morning and the evening before, until Sunday.
On Sunday I got my laundry going that I usually start on Thursdays, and I did the dishes. Other than that, I loafed around recovering from all the activity on the holidays and got some reading done.
On Monday morning, Wayne and I went to Costco, and Monday afternoon/evening, I had my art class as usual. When I arrived, people were standing around outside. At first, I thought that no one had arrived to unlock the door, but then I saw several of the teachers walk in. We had no power. The neighborhood had power, and someone had already tried the breakers, so I don’t know what was wrong. Soon, the husband of the owner arrived and went inside and after a minute or so, the lights were back on. We had class, and just as I was finishing washing my brushes, the lights went off again. Our instructor had us pack up, and she was just about to lead us all down the stairs (I was sure I was going to fall down them) using her cell phone as a light, when the lights came back on. One of the instructors had watched what he did to get them working again. However, I was not foolhardy enough to take the elevator going back down.
I had a doctor’s appointment in Vancouver on Tuesday morning. That was for my dermatologist, but it was a little odd. I have gone there once a year ever since my basal carcinoma was removed, but this time they told me I was supposed to be going every six months. They had clearly told me to come back in a year, twice, because that’s what I had been doing. Very odd.
I was almost home when I went around a corner on our twisty road home and saw a blue pickup shoot off the road across someone’s pasture, hit a large tree, and bounce off. I stopped next to it on the road and had difficulty finding my emergency blinkers, since I never use them. Then I called 911 as the driver opened the door of the truck and fell out. I stupidly didn’t hit the green button and couldn’t figure out why I didn’t have any reception, but I finally got through. Also, I got out of the car once the phone started ringing, forgetting that the sound was going to go through my car GPS system, and had to get back in to talk to the 911 operator. Obviously, I was a bit shook up.
By then, a Fedex driver had also stopped, and he was able to get the address of the farm we were stopped next to. (Of course, I got a lecture from Wayne when I got home about stopping on the road instead of turning into the guy’s driveway some way down the road, but I was concerned about the driver of the car.) The driver was a young girl who was obviously in shock. Her hands were shaking, she was crying, she had a big red blotch on her arm, which she was cradling, and all she could think about was calling her mom. We were trying to get her to sit down as instructed by the 911 operator, and she finally did, but the whole time she was on her phone. The property owner brought a jacket for her, and once we were both there, the Fedex guy left. The EMTs and fire department didn’t take long to arrive, but in the meantime, I had to talk to her mother, who was trying to send a friend to ride along in the ambulance with the girl. But they had her in the ambulance, and the friend never arrived. I was waiting around because I didn’t know if I needed to wait for the police as a witness. Finally the fire chief got an answer that I could go. So, I was only a half hour later than usual. While we were standing around, the property owner told me there had been 18 accidents on that bend that his house is on since he moved there 25 years ago. You could see her tire tracks across his grass coming straight from the curve, which she didn’t make at all, over the fence, over a sizable tree, which was lying in the yard, and into the big spruce tree.
I had made arrangements for my Christmas Elf (aka my great niece, Mischa) to come over after school on Tuesday afternoon to help me decorate the tree. Usually she is done with her schoolwork about noon (Tuesday is one of her home-school days), but that day she was about two hours later than usual because of a difficult and too-long math assignment. She arrived about two. However, together we can do in a couple of hours what it used to take me an entire day to do. We were done by four, even with a cake break. I’m guessing that soon she won’t want to help her old auntie decorate, but while she is eager to do it, that’s great. We always have a nice time. Next year, her brother might come over and help, too.
This week the county reports total number of cases up 979. That’s 761 confirmed and 218 probable. Number of active cases is down 48. Number of deaths is up 15, with a note that two deaths that occurred in 2020 were added to this week’s count.
This week my friend Ray flew in from Denver for a visit. He arrived last Wednesday. After we picked him up from the airport, we went home for a short while before going out to lunch on the waterfront at Wildfin Grill. Then Wayne and I had appointments to get our Moderna boosters, so we went to Walgreens before returning home. I made pelmeni soup for dinner and we got Ray hooked on Stranger Things. Now I fear we will be watching the entire series over again.
The weather for the entire week was predicted to be rainy, so on Thursday Ray and I went out to the movies and saw The French Dispatch. Although I have really liked the last two Wes Anderson movies I saw, this one was formatted like a series of stories, and as such I was much less invested in it, because it didn’t spend much time with any of the characters. It was quirky, as usual, and had a distinct look to it. We came home and I made pot roast for dinner in my Instant Pot. Delicious.
It’s become Wayne’s habit not to participate in much of visitor entertainment except if it involves eating. On Friday, we decided to go eat at one of our favorite places in the area, Fuel Bistro, where we haven’t eaten since the pandemic. Wayne was up for that, especially as it involved eating the chocolate chip cookie, which is a huge cookie fresh baked in a little iron skillet with vanilla ice cream on top. After we got back from Fuel, Ray, Luke, and I went out for a hike on a logging trail up Dunegan Mountain. It’s about 2.5 miles total, but we turned around before we got to the top by mutual decision. The trail is steadily uphill on the way out, but I think Ray had a hard time with the large gravel, especially on the way down. We were actually lucky enough that every time we went out during the week, it stopped raining, even though it rained a lot every day.
On Saturday we took Luke out for a walk on our road, and then Ray and I drove to the Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. One spring, Maja and I happened to go there when there were thousands upon thousands of water birds, many of them nesting. This time when we took the auto tour (which is the only thing allowed in fall and spring), we saw lots of birds and six deer, but not as many birds as before. However, without attempting to identify most of the birds, we saw egrets, herons, sandhill cranes, and some raptors, probably hawks, as well as hundreds of ducks which we couldn’t really see well enough to try to identify. (We took our binoculars but then didn’t use them, just took the tour and looked at the birds.) At one point, we were parked less than two yards from a heron. After that, we went for lunch at Planet Thai in Vancouver and brought home take-out for Wayne.
On Sunday we packed up early and set out for Seaside. We booked a two-bedroom suite in the same hotel that I stayed last time. It was a nice room, although to fit in the second bedroom and bathroom, there were some odd angles. I let Ray pick bedrooms, because I had the big one several years ago when we went to Lincoln City, and he picked the nice big one. Mine was small and because a corner of it was cut away to allow more room around the breakfast bar in the kitchen, they had the wardrobe half covering the window. But I just was spending the night in it so no big deal. The only thing was that to get dressed, I had to squeeze in front of the wardrobe to get out a piece of clothing and then squeeze around it again to have room to put it on. Because I wasn’t thinking and didn’t take everything out at once, I had to do that several times. But really, it was an inexpensive, clean, nice place to stay with a nice living room with a fireplace and a full kitchen. However, as it turned out, we didn’t spend much time there.
A view from Ecola Park
After dropping our stuff off at the hotel, we went to John and Lucie’s house. We visited there a while, and then John took us out sightseeing. It was rainy, so Lucie didn’t want to go because of her arthritis. But we had the luck that when we wanted to get out of the car to go look at things, the rain stopped. We went to Ecola Park on Tillamook Head and saw several really great views.
That took a couple of hours, and then we returned back to their house, where Lucie had prepared appetizers and a nice dinner. I hadn’t realized until I saw the appetizers how hungry I was. It turned out John, who has learned how to bake in the last year, had made me a birthday cake. Then we all sat around and chatted until very late, after midnight. Ray said he had a good time, so I didn’t think we were boring him with our stories.
In the morning I felt a little subpar because I didn’t sleep much, which is usual for me in a strange bed (even though that one was very comfortable). Ray and I went out for breakfast at Pig n Pancake (delicious!) and then we went back to John and Lucie’s to visit for a while and say goodbye. We originally planned for John to go with us on our next expedition, but he suggested it would probably be more direct for us to leave from Cape Disappointment, which was our planned outing, rather than have to come all the way back to their house. He thought we would be going home via Aberdeen, but after we saw the park (gorgeous), the GPS brought us back through Astoria. We drove over the bridge at Astoria and to Cape Disappointment, where we spent a couple of hours looking at views and lighthouses and took a few short hikes. We had very nice weather that day, even some sunshine.
We arrived home around 4:30 or 5, and then it was Wayne’s turn to take me out for my birthday. We ended up picking Goldie’s barbecue because there really aren’t that many great restaurants around here, and we had already gone to Planet Thai, which would have been another choice. Yum, lots of barbecue.
On Tuesday we made plans to go to the Bond movie with Wayne. He actually agreed to go out, and it was a good movie, although I don’t think any Bond movie will ever surpass Skyfall.
And that brings us to today, when I dropped Ray at the airport at 9:30. I am late posting this blog because I didn’t have time to write it yesterday, when I usually would have. It was an action-packed week.
Our number of cases for the virus has risen about 600 to 21,101. The current number of probable cases is up to 945, so 80 more than last week, and the number of active cases is 645, so up more than 100. The number of deaths is up to 255. Our rate is 198.1 per 100K population.
On Tuesday morning I took Luke out as I usually do first thing and spotted about eight goldfinches on branches above our bird feeder, as well as one at the feeder. I thought I had seen one earlier in the week, but I had my reading glasses on, and by the time I fetched my other glasses, it was gone. I haven’t seen goldfinches here before even though I know they’re around, so seeing that many made me happy. They were still hanging around when I took Luke out for his walk later.
We went from a few very hot days to cooler again, and two to three inches of rain were promised over the weekend. Unfortunately, since it has been a record dry April, it rained lightly on Saturday, probably 1/2 inch, we got no rain on Sunday, just dark, gloomy clouds, and on Monday it misted for part of the day and was warmer. On Tuesday it was dark and colder again, but no rain.
It’s late Monday afternoon. The sun is in front the house striking these trees behind the house before it goes down below the roofline. The sky is dark and gloomy, but nothing will come of it. This sight was a lot more dramatic looking than this photo captures.
Because of the lack of rain, Wayne has missed his window for burning our burn pile. Everyone was burning earlier in the year, but first he was waiting for a dry day (most people burn when it is raining a little) and then he was waiting for it to rain and then do it on the next dry day, and it never rained. Now there is a burn ban, so he’ll have to wait until possibly next spring. He continues to take a tarp off the pile during the day and put it back on at night. I have told him that any weathering, even rain, will eventually dry the pile out more, but he doesn’t believe me. I’ve never seen anyone else out here with a tarp on their burn pile. Wayne always knows best—about everything—at least so he thinks.
On Thursday I thought Maja and I were going to go hiking, but we rescheduled to Friday that morning. I was happy about the change in plans, because I like lolling around the house on my dog-free carefree Thursdays, but it turned out that I was a little busier than that. Wayne wanted to go to the shoe store in Vancouver to buy new inserts for his shoes. When we got there, I persuaded him that he also needed new shoes, as he hasn’t bought any for several years, and his were beat. So, he got some new athletic shoes just about identical to his old ones. I saw some shoes I liked, but he decided they were too expensive (this store, which specializes in shoes that are good for your feet, doesn’t have any cheap shoes), so I didn’t get them. In truth, I have lots of shoes, just not any athletic shoes, so I make do with either hiking shoes or water shoes, depending on the setting.
After the shoe store, we drove clear to the other side of town (Vancouver is long and skinny along the Columbia; it looks like a piece of spaghetti) to World Market looking for McVities, as we have been unable to get any from Fred Meyer in months. World Market didn’t have any, so we bought some other digestives, but they aren’t as good. They also didn’t have Violet Crumble, and the clerk told us that they only carry it at Christmas. That might be true now, but it wasn’t true before, and it seems like a stupid decision, because every time I go there to get it, I’m told stories of people buying 15 bars at a time, since it’s the only place in town to get it. I forgot to look for the one thing they might have had that I intended to buy, a can of decaf espresso, since Wayne is going through a phase of making us cappuccino many mornings lately. (He does this then he seems to forget about it for years at a time, but it’s a treat when he remembers.)
After that, we called in an order for a very late lunch to pick up on the way home from Pita House. We got home with about an hour to spend before having to pick up Lukey. The trainer told me he was a very good boy and did a lot of playing that day. He is not much of a player, so it’s good news when he does something other than sit on his butt and watch the other dogs.
On Friday, Maja, Luke, and I went on the hike from Yacolt Burn trailhead toward Larch Mountain that I took with my relatives a month or so ago. I had thought that since the rise on this hike was so manageable, I might eventually get to the top of Larch Mountain, but now I’m not so sure. I was mistaken about which trail we were on before. That is, we were on the Tarbell Trail, but I misunderstood the maps. Instead of being about 2.6 miles to the top of the mountain, it is about 3 miles on the Tarbell to the Larch Mountain trail, and then another 2.6 miles to the top. The total going in and out is 11 miles, which I am in no condition to attempt. So far, the farthest I have hiked is seven miles, and that was on relatively flat trails.
So, Maja and I went about four miles total, in and out. We took a detour at one point, because it wasn’t clear what path to follow, but then when we got back on track, we didn’t go quite as far as I did with my relatives the first time. Still, I was good and tired when we got home (so was Luke), and I was achy that night. It’s been a winter and spring with too little exercise.
We only encountered five mountain bikers on the trail. The first two came around a corner on the downhill so quickly and quietly that they had to skid to a stop to avoid hitting us. Luke was farther down the trail, so I called him back to sit at my feet and then they went past us. Later, on our way back, we encountered the same two bikers. I called Luke again to sit at my feet off the path, and the first biker whispered “Cute dog,” while the second biker said, “Well-behaved dog.” Good Lukey!
Saturday was so wet and gloomy that we didn’t go out at all. We had a fire for the first time in several weeks and stayed in reading. However, I heard from my brother inviting me to spend some time with them in Seaside, and since we are all vaccinated now, stay in their house instead of a hotel. I figured out a day to go, and I am leaving next Tuesday for a few days. Can’t wait to go somewhere.
I also heard from my sister-in-law Nancy inviting me to come over on Sunday or Monday and take some forsythia cuttings for my orchard fence. Luke and I went over about 11 AM on Sunday with my bucket, and she clipped off some cuttings for me. Lukey was really excited to see Freckles, even though the feeling wasn’t mutual.
On Sunday afternoon, I planted my cuttings, and since then, Wayne has been working on getting a hose down to the orchard so that I can start watering the trees and new bushes. I have the forsythia as well as two new hydrangeas that I planted last fall. We have cut down the dead hydrangea bush to about a foot tall, and we are hoping it will come back. I think the walnut tree, the grove of alders, and the big fir next to it have deprived it of enough sunshine. I just hope the bush next to it doesn’t die, too.
On Monday, my niece asked me if I would like a fig tree, as she got two by mistake from the shipper. I said yes. On Tuesday, Wayne and I went out to dig up our dead plum tree so that we could put the fig in its place, and in the afternoon, my sister came over and planted the fig tree. I am not a huge fan of figs, but with our track record of fruit in the orchard, I’m not too worried about having too many figs around. Anyway, maybe I’ll learn to make fig jam, which I have learned to like in the past few years. I actually thought I might put an ornamental tree where the plum had been, but if I ever get around to buy one, I can find another place for it. I would really like something that would blossom pink or purple in my orchard. I have plenty of white. In fact the cherry trees are in full bloom now (I have tried to take pictures of this before, but it never looks like anything in a photo) and the apple blossoms are just coming out. But when I bought my magnolia, which hasn’t blossomed yet, they only had white. Oh well.
The other thing my sister did while she was here was pull out a beensy little chainsaw and offer to cut down the rampant vegetation on our raised “landscaped” area in front of the house. We have a rise in front of our house that is planted with azaleas and rhododendrons and other decorative plants as well as decorative rock formations and a currently nonworking fountain with a waterfall. It looked great when we moved in, because our tenants kept it in control with goats. However, it is too steep a slope for me to maintain by myself, and lots of alders have planted themselves in among the plants we want there. In truth, it was looking bad. I can trim it up to a point, but then it gets too steep for me, so there was an actual line of trees growing right under the azalea bushes at the top. Sue went right up the ridge with her chainsaw and my loppers and lopped off all those errant trees. We now have a huge pile of them in our driveway to dispose of. The only ones left are a few small ones at the bottom that I can do and a few at the back that I can probably get to, too, although one would require a chainsaw. I also have to do some shaping of the bushes, if I can reach the awkward spots.
The few puny lilac blossoms that have finally appeared on one of my bushes
Up in my boxes, my tulips and daffodils are all out, and in fact some are starting to fade already. And just yesterday I realized, I have lilacs! After planting three bushes, the first four years ago, the second three, and the third last year, I finally have a small number of blossoms on the newest bush. It’s better than nothing. The older two bushes still have no sign of blossoms.
This week the county reports 18,843 total cases of the virus, 259 of which are active. The number of deaths so far is 232. Our rate has gone way down to 88.8, which is good, although I’m not sure why, as it seems there are more cases this week than last. I’m sure the vaccines have a lot to do with it, though.
Speaking of which, everyone over 65 in my family who hadn’t got it already is scheduled for or has had their first vaccine this week. My middle brother and his wife, who live in Oregon, were the last ones to go, and when they heard that Walmart would be scheduling vaccines in Oregon, my sister-in-law got right online and got herself an appointment. Then she told him about it, and he got right online, and there were no appointments left. He gave up, but she kept trying and was able to get a canceled appointment for him. And, if you remember, I signed up both myself and Wayne on the county website for a vaccine months ago. Well, today Wayne got an automated call from Peace Health about getting a vaccine, but since he has already had his first shot and has an appointment for the second, he won’t be calling them back. I think that is interesting, because I was first on their list of the two of us, since I registered us both. Maybe they are doing it by age.
On Wednesday, I went out to see a gastroenterologist. I guess I get to have my first upper G. I. in a couple of weeks. Just to make it more fun, I am due for my colonoscopy, so we’re doing both. For some reason, my doctor’s office referred me to a gastroenterologist all the way in Gresham, Oregon, about an hour’s drive away. I made a feeble attempt to get it changed, but realized I wasn’t explicit enough. When the girl called to give me the appointment, I said, “Where did you say this was?” and she said “Legacy Mount Hood.” I said, “Is that in Oregon?” and she said, “Yes.” I said I lived in Yacolt, and she told me she didn’t know where that was. I said, “Don’t they have something at Salmon Creek?” (a half hour away) and she said, “We have something in White Salmon” (two hours away). I realize now that I should have asked her if they had something in Vancouver, as she obviously didn’t know that Salmon Creek is in Vancouver. Later, I called my doctor’s P. A. and left a message about it, but he never called back, so I just went.
I remembered later that I went to a gastroenterologist at Vancouver Clinic a couple of years ago, but I also remember thinking that he was the least interested doctor I had ever met. He seemed incredibly bored. My doctor had referred me to him because of some blood count numbers, and both he and my nephrologist were worried about them, but the bored gastroenterologist said he didn’t think they were a problem (without running any tests or doing anything else) and that was that. So, I obviously didn’t want to return to him.
Anyway, that’s the sum of the exciting adventures for this week, except I actually got Wayne to go for a walk on Tuesday. It has been alternating days of rain with really beautiful but cold days (the meteorologist says we have been having temperatures that are more normal for February than March), and Tuesday was one of the beautiful ones. We had spoken about going for a walk the day before, but I fully expected Wayne to cop out. He started to tell me his knees were bothering him (his usual excuse, but the exact reason why he needs to walk more), and then he suddenly said, “I guess we should go.” So, the three of us went to Moulton Falls, the Hantwick entrance, which is an easy one, with a path that is mostly flat and paved some way out. We didn’t go far, perhaps 0.6 to 0.8 miles, but that was 0.6 to 0.8 miles more than I’ve gotten him to go in years. I hope to be able to coax him out regularly enough so that he becomes able to go further. He complained to me, though, that the path was not flat. I guess maybe he would have preferred to drive in to Battle Ground and walk on the city streets.
When we were returned to the car, I forgot I didn’t wear any special footwear and didn’t have my hiking poles, and I tried to go up the grass slope, which is a little steep, to the car. I slipped and fell flat on my face. I didn’t hurt myself, I don’t think, but the trouble was getting back up. Even with Wayne’s cane and Wayne to help, it was difficult. My sister has been telling me that I should practice getting up and down from the floor. I know I should, but it involves getting on my knees to get back up (I can’t do it any other way), and that hurts. I have to do it occasionally, most usually when Roomba gets stuck under the bed, but I don’t look forward to it and I certainly don’t want to do it for no reason.
It doesn’t look like I’ll be doing my regular hike anytime soon. Maja has been too busy helping the little girl who lives in her barn apartment with her schoolwork, since her mother is a teacher. I am not sure why she’s having to put in as much time now that the girl is back in school, as she has been for months, but Maja now also has a friend who injured herself and Maja has been helping her. She said she doesn’t know when she will be able to go, and my niece reports that she and my sister are spending all their nice days in the garden.
We have continued to see a lot of the deer lately. On Friday, I think, I was walking Luke and a car approached, so I spoke to Luke to sit down next to me. That spooked a deer that was apparently right next to us (but invisible) in the woods next to our pond. She ran off across our pasture and into Maja’s yard, where she stood behind the barn for quite some time. I kept my eye on her for the part of the walk where she was visible, and she stayed there the entire time. On the way back from that walk, as I passed between our pond on one side of the road and a much smaller pond on the other, a couple of mallards flew off from the smaller pond. I hadn’t realized they were there, and I apparently spooked them.
Tuesday morning, I saw two brown ducks on the far side of the pond, but they were underneath some foliage, so it was hard to see them. Then Wayne came up from working outside and told me that he had scared off a couple of Canadian geese from the pond when he turned on the weed whacker. His record for that on Tuesday was poor, because when I was washing the dishes, I spotted first one, then two, then all three deer over by the pond. I watched them for a long time, and at one point they were all three together, so I went to get my phone to take a picture. I was only gone about 30 seconds, but in that time, Wayne started the lawnmower, and by the time I got back, they had vanished.
Still, it’s been quite nice to see so much of the wildlife, especially the deer, lately.
This week our county reports 18,585 total cases with 188 active. The number of deaths so far is 228. Our rate is finally down around the one the country wanted before areas loosened restrictions, 103.4.
And on that front, I have heard that all of the rest of my qualifying family members here in Washington are supposed to get their first doses this week. However, my brother and sister-in-law from Oregon haven’t heard anything, which is worrisome because of his heart condition. They said that Oregon opened it up for teachers before they finished 80-year-olds and over, so they don’t think they’re getting a vaccine soon.
And speaking of which, they are here again this week, visiting the contained household of my niece. They were originally supposed to arrive on Friday, but on Tuesday night I got a message that they were arriving the next day. I got another one saying they would get here about noon. I guess I should have just gone over there at noon, because it was a beautiful day and Luke and I could have used some exercise. Instead, I waited to hear from them after they arrived, thinking they were unpacking and such, and by the time I went over there, they were all gone. They went on a hike without me. They picked one that I probably couldn’t do, but I would have liked it if they had swapped around and done one that I could go on the first day when it was so nice.
I saw them in the evening around a campfire, and it was cold. The kids and my sister-in-law were wearing Comfys, so I went right home after we broke up and bought one. During the summer, even though it is usually chilly out at night, we can sit there and gab for hours, but I think I only saw them for about an hour that night before we decided we were turning into popsicles.
Here’s the view from the Tarbell Trail on the way toward Hidden Falls from the Tarbell trailhead. At this point the day didn’t look so threatening.
The next day wasn’t quite so nice, but they decided to hike again, this time the Tarbell Trail out in the Yacolt Burn from the Tarbell trailhead toward Hidden Falls. I had done that one before, so I went with them, but because it was Luke’s Doggy Day Care day, he didn’t get to go. Another reason I wish they had swapped hikes. It was gloomy and threatened rain the entire hike, and we actually probably turned around earlier than we would have because it looked like it was going to rain, although it did not. As usual, I was tagging along at the end. This is a hike that goes uphill for about 3/4 of a mile at about a 30 degree angle, so I was huffing and puffing the whole way. Then it levels out when it crosses the road and goes across a big logged area. So, we were finally at the level area when they decided to go back. It took us an hour to go out less than a mile, and only a short time to get back.
I didn’t see them on Friday because they went fishing or indeed any time during the weekend except the day Luke and I stopped by. They were trying to rebuild the greenhouse, the roof of which collapsed during the snowstorm, on a day that was intermittently rainy. I visited with them for a while and then went home and let them get on with it. I think that was Saturday.
On Monday, I had a dentist appointment to replace a crown, because it was worn down and I was experiencing pain underneath it. When he removed my old crown, I had the first cavity I have had in years and years underneath. He replaced my crown with this stuff that looks like teeth, doing it all in one visit.
After I returned, I learned that, instead of coming over here as originally planned, another hike was in the offing. This time they picked a trail that none of us was familiar with, the Tarbell Trail again (it makes a huge diamond out in the middle of the Yacolt Burn) only going from the Yacolt Burn trailhead toward Larch Mountain. We had started from that trailhead before and taken it the other way, but that way, they have turned it into a biking trail, with huge ramps you have to climb over. It is really not fun as a hiking trail anymore, because there are too many obstacles.
The Tarbell Trail toward Larch Mountain. You can see that it has a nice gradual incline.
I really liked this trail. It was also all uphill, but it was uphill at a gradual angle, so that I was getting exercise but didn’t feel like I was killing myself. Of course, I lagged behind, because everyone else in my family can just walk up it normally, but I am panting up it. However, it was very nice. It was a cold, gloomy day, but it meant we didn’t get hot. The trail goes through light forest and meadows and then deeper forest as it goes up. We were trying to go out two miles and then come back, but the kids started begging us to turn around before we were quite to the two-mile mark, so we went just short of four miles total. I got a good workout, and the others probably got a nice walk in the woods. I plan to go back to that trail with Maja sometime, if I haven’t lost her as a hiking companion. We haven’t hiked in a long time, because she always has some kind of issue.
On Tuesday, I had long-standing plans with Christine. Of course, the night before, my brother changed our plans for them to come over in the late afternoon, because the family decided to go for a long hike on Mt. St. Helens. I told him I couldn’t go because of my other plans (which we had already discussed). I haven’t heard how their hike went.
Christine and I time our dogs’ grooming appointments so that we can have a dogless day out. On Tuesday we decided to try going out to lunch. I thought it seemed fairly safe because we were in a small booth over by ourselves, and the waiter had a mask, but as we were leaving, I noticed that no one else had a mask anywhere near their tables, whereas we had ours on unless we were eating. We have both received our vaccines, but we aren’t two weeks beyond them (I am but Christine has a week to go), so although we relaxed our restrictions a bit just with each other, we kept using them with everyone else.
Afterwards, we went for a walk right around the restaurant, and then we drove around (in the same car but with masks) and looked at some of the neighborhoods in Battle Ground that are more interesting. We got back to Christine’s and visited for a short while, and then I got the call to pick up Luke.
At the bottom center of the photo, you can see two deer under our deck.
We have seen quite a bit of the deer this week. On Sunday morning they were down in the area below our house, near the wolf pen. I took a photo of them, but as usual, they are barely visible. We only saw two at that time, but we watched them for about a half hour. Then yesterday, they were in our side yard again—one was very close to us just next to the driveway—and then they ran downhill between the garage and the shed and were hanging out around the wolf pen. We thought there were only two again, but one must be really good at hiding, because Wayne thought they were gone and went out on the deck with Luke, but Luke saw them and began barking, and three of them ran away. However, at least one of them stuck around and was down on the other side of the wolf pen for at least another half hour.
This week the county has had 17,164 cases, 656 of which are active. Number of deaths is up to 186. Our rate per 100,000 is 401.23. It does seem like numbers are slowly going down, but I don’t want to speak too soon.
Last Tuesday night, you might remember that I got an appointment for a vaccineon Thursday. Then, on Wednesday I started to worry about it, because the confirmation email I got was worded as if they thought I was a Legacy Health employee. I looked back at the original invitation and the registration pages, and they looked as if they were for regular people, so I thought that perhaps they had forgotten to reword their original confirmation email from when they were vaccinating employees. Still, I was a little worried that I would get there and be sent away.
So, on Thursday evening I left fairly early to drive the half hour to the medical center. The Salmon Creek hospital also has a medical office complex at the same address, and because of the wording of the email, for some reason, I thought I was going to the medical building. So, I parked behind the medical building and walked up to the back door. It was locked, and a sign said to go to the main entrance. So, not seeing a good way around the building, I moved my car to the parking garage, which is across the entrance from the medical building and next to the hospital. Then I walked across the entrance driveway to the medical building again, only to find the door locked. I guess by “main entrance,” they must mean the hospital, although why they don’t say that, I don’t know. In fact, in all of their communications, they made no distinction between the hospital and the medical office building. Luckily, there was an employee in the front hallway, and she came to the door and told me to go to the hospital.
When I walked into the hospital, the registration for the vaccine clinic was right there. I had to stand in a short line to register, and then they gave me a plasticized card to write my name and date of birth on in dry erase marker (which they cleaned off as soon as I got my vaccine and used over) and told me to take a seat. I think I had been in my seat about 30 seconds when they called our group and herded us into a series of elevators, three people to an elevator. We went up a floor and got into another, longer line, and stood in line about five or ten minutes before getting our vaccines. Then we were told to sit in the hallway for 15 minutes to make sure we didn’t have side effects and then walk around the corner and register for our second vaccination. After I placed a to-go order at a Thai restaurant nearby, I got up and walked around and made my appointment instead of waiting, and then I walked back and sat down for 10 minutes. I was glad I did it that way, because by the time I left, there was a long line to make an appointment. I think I might have been there for a total of 25 minutes, depending upon whether I was still early when I got to the hospital. It all went very smoothly, and I have an appointment for my second vaccine at the end of the month. Neither Wayne nor Christine has heard about their first vaccine, and I only mention them because they are both Legacy patients, like me. So far, I am the only person I know of in this area who has had a vaccine, besides medical personnel and care facility patients. Of course, that probably reflects how few people I know here, but really, we don’t hear much about people getting vaccine appointments.
To go on with the medical theme, when I visited my nephrologist last month, she asked me about my heartburn medication, which was changed from Zantac to Pepcid last year after Zantac got pulled from the market. I confessed that Pepcid didn’t seem to work as well, that I was conscious of a slight feeling of discomfort. I’m not even sure that is an accurate description. It’s more like I am aware of that area in my body, which I wasn’t when I took Zantac, if that makes any sense. Well, she changed me to Omeprazole. I found that Omeprazole didn’t work at all, so I contacted her, and she told me to take a double dose for two weeks and then go back to a regular dose. That worked better, but it was still worse than the Pepcid, and then when I went back to the regular dose last week, well, watch out. On Thursday, just before I was due to drive over for my vaccine, I actually thought I might be having a heart attack, it felt so bad. This was after a couple of nights when I had to take Pepto Bismol to go to sleep. When I tell you that I never had bad heartburn in my life (except for one unfortunate incident involving airplane food) and was put on the medication because of other symptoms, you’ll understand how shocking this was to me. A couple days before this incident, I messaged my nephrologist and told her the Omeprazole wasn’t working, and she said that since neither drug worked for me, I should go back to my regular doctor about it. On Friday, I went back to Pepcid myself and left a message with my doctor’s assistant, hoping he could just call me back and tell me what to do. He told me I probably needed more tests and asked me to make an appointment, which I did for Tuesday morning. Actually, the Pepcid works so much better than the Omeprazole that it makes me wonder what I was complaining about.
On Monday morning I got up earlier than usual because I had a fairly early appointment to have my nose debrided again. Shortly after 7AM, the phone rang. It was Vancouver Clinic telling me they had to reschedule this appointment for later. They made it for the same day at 12:30. It’s a good thing they called so early, because it takes almost an hour to get to that particular clinic, which is in far eastern Vancouver. Vancouver is a long, thin city stretched along the Columbia. It’s shaped sort of like a piece of spaghetti, so it can take a lot longer to get to some parts than others.
I went in at 12:30 and the nurse looked at my nose and had the doctor come in and debride it again. (This time she called it “debreed.”) They told me I probably didn’t need to come in again for that, but that I would have to come in about three weeks from now because my nose was going to heal with a little button shape on it (I don’t think it’s what they mean by a button nose), and they would have to sand it down. Ouch! That’s because the skin graft died, I guess, or at least most of it did.
When I asked about the rescheduling, the nurse told me that the second dose of the vaccine is particularly hard on young people. They had all had it last week, and four girls called in sick. She said that they don’t have any extra people, so if someone is not there, they all have to do double duty. So, they moved all her appointments to her lunch hour so that she could help out with what the sick girls were supposed to be doing. If this makes you wonder whether I had any side effects from the first vaccine, I’ll tell you no, just a bruise on my arm.
We have found a good barbecue place (very hard to find here) on the way back from that clinic, so I picked up barbecue and took it home for linner after my appointment. We have found that we don’t often want both lunch and dinner anymore, so we sometimes have a late lunch/early dinner, which we call linner.
Monday must have been medical reschedule day, because later on I got a call from the doctor’s office telling me they had to reschedule my appointment to discuss my heartburn, so now that’s set for Friday. I am glad to say that because I put myself back on Pepcid, I feel okay.
Gosh, I hate talking about medical stuff, so I would imagine that this has bored you silly. Let’s talk about something else.
Yesterday morning Fedex delivered a big package to Wayne. It turns out he ordered a great big pump, saying that if a forest fire came near, we could pump water out of our pond to keep the house wet. Wayne sometimes complains that I spend too much money, but I have noticed that while I tend to buy books in packages of $35 a pop (to avoid shipping fees) from Amazon, when he spends money, it’s always on things that cost hundreds or thousands of dollars. Now he’s feeling rich because he got a small part of his legacy from his brother, and he has probably spent more than that much. So now we own yet another expensive thing that we will probably never use. Maybe if the pump will work for draining the fountain so we can clean it out and get it working, it’ll be worth it, but I doubt it. The pumps he bought for that purpose turned out to be insufficient.
The remnants of just a few minutes of violent hail in our front yard
I am beginning to think that this year we will not get any substantial snow, because it’s already February. The snow that was forecast for five days in a row last week didn’t really materialize except for some stuff that lasted only a couple of hours. Yesterday, however, we were driving out to PNW Best Fish Company to pick up fish and chips when we were caught in a violent hail storm about 20 minutes from our house. Earlier in the day, it had slushed at home. That is, something was coming down that was halfway between rain and hail, causing a small bit of accumulation on our deck. In the afternoon, thundershowers were forecast, but what we got was this really fierce hailstorm that suddenly appeared and in no time had accumulated ice on the road. When we passed through it, we met sun and melted slush. When we got home, although we saw no sign of it except when we returned back through the area where it had originally hit, it had clearly also been through our neighborhood.
Then last night I got up with Luke, and thinking he needed to go outside, I looked out to what appeared to be a lawn covered in snow. Water was pouring down from our eaves, though, so I thought perhaps the “snow” was an optical illusion of the grass in the darkness. Luke wouldn’t go out, so instead of putting on my boots and going out with him, I called him back into the house. This morning, however, I saw that it had indeed been snow that was almost completely melted, but the roof was still covered and there were patches of snow all over the lawn. That’s funny because although snow was originally forecast for today, the forecast had changed to rain.
Hiking opportunities did not abound this week, because it rained almost every day. In any case, when I sent out the hiking message last week, I got a response from my niece that she might be able to go on Friday, and then Maja said that might work for her. I started trying to find out on Thursday if this was going to happen, but the only response I got was from Maja, who said she could not go. By Friday morning, I still hadn’t heard anything, so I made plans to go over to Christine’s with Luke around 10:30. Then I got a typical message from my sister, which announced that she was going after lunch with the kids and where she was going. I thought I probably wouldn’t be back from Christine’s by then, and I don’t believe in changing plans unless there’s an emergency. So, it worked out that Luke and I didn’t get to hike this week. I probably should have had more patience, but I had something I wanted to take over to Christine’s. In any case, it bothers me a bit that my sister always announces when and where she is going, often with very little warning, even though I’m the one who sends out the invitation to hike every week. Maja and I always have a bit of a consultation about when and where we want to go.
I met my sister walking on the road on the way home from my Monday appointment last week, and she told me that she was planning to walk it Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays . I told her I would come along but I was just bringing lunch home (the barbecue). So, she said she would let me know when she was ready to go each day. She actually did on Wednesday, and Luke and I walked with her even though it was raining a little bit, but I haven’t heard about it since then.
Wayne and I finished all the episodes of Death in Paradise. Although we know the tenth season is out, it’s not on Britbox yet. We then decided to watch the old episodes of Prime Suspect, because I had a sense that perhaps I hadn’t seen them all. Now I’m not sure, because I looked it up and saw that they didn’t do a series every year. It seems to be just as good now as when I first saw it, except now you notice the production values. On Monday night, we decided to watch an episode of All Creatures Great and Small, so that we could compare it with the new series. I had never watched the old series, but Wayne used to. We decided that the new series, while similar, is better.
That’s about it for this week. I feel guilty that I have been so dragged down by the rain lately that I haven’t made sure Luke gets out for a walk every day. To be fair to myself, Luke doesn’t want to walk in the rain, but that shouldn’t stop me. He has lately started to just sit up at the top of the driveway and watch me go instead of following me out onto the road. Usually, if I just keep going, he eventually follows, but one day last week I got all the way to pond, and he was still sitting at the top of the driveway. So, I have resorted to the leash again. I am hoping that this phase won’t last long, because it was nice not to have to take the leash on our walks.
This week the county reports a total of 16,502 cases of the virus, up about 700 from last week, which I suppose is an improvement. There are 709 active cases, and 170 deaths. Our rate per 100,000 is the same.
The messaging about the vaccine is difficult to understand. I read that a mass vaccination site would open at the fairgrounds on Tuesday, with the capacity for 600 shots a day. However, in one place I read that it would be by appointment only, while the radio said that if you had signed up on the website you could go. I have signed us both up on the website, but because of these mixed messages, I have no idea whether we can go or not. The website says we’ll be contacted by someone for an appointment. I would hate to sit in line for hours only to be sent away, but I would hate to get lost in bureaucracy, too.
More confusing vaccination things follow. First, Tuesday morning I got a message from Vancouver Clinic that said they would start registering their patients 65 and older for vaccines, that we would receive a message telling us to make an appointment, and then it was up to us to make the appointment. That would be fine except I only go to Vancouver Clinic for my specialty doctors, and the last time we tried to go to VC Urgent Care in Battle Ground, they turned us away because they aren’t a primary provider for us. So, I am wondering if we will ever hear from them about the appointment or whether, if we do, they will turn us away when we get there. Or, if they are just going to vaccinate everyone, primary or not.
Then, I noticed their email gave us another location to sign up for the Clark County fairgrounds site. However, when I tried to do that, it said it had no appointments available for any of the months I looked at. I looked up until June, although I doubt that they are actually scheduling that far out. I don’t know if the original Clark County website I signed up with will schedule for the fairgrounds location or not.
Finally, after I wrote this post yesterday, I got an email from Legacy Health, which is our primary provider, with an invitation to sign up for an appointment. I did so, and I am having my first vaccine on Thursday. Wayne, however, did not get a message so far, nor did my friend Christine, who is older and is also a Legacy patient. I don’t know what their criteria is for extending the invitations, but I do have a couple of comorbidities, so maybe the doctors in their system have ranked their patients, and I am towards the top.
I have been obsessed by my face all week. The object was to not let my skin graft die by keeping it moist with petroleum jelly, and that’s what I did, but starting on Thursday night I began to smell a strange, kind of sickly odor. On Saturday morning, my skin graft looked to be covered in pus, so I called the number they gave me. Even though they said they would be available at any time, the nurse told me they would call me back on Monday.
On Monday, they never called me back, so I called about 10 AM, and they told me to come in. What had happened was that the top layer of my skin graft had died. They told me the result would be the same, that it would just be a little smellier for me. They said the lower layer was still healthy and connecting in to my blood cells, so that’s good. The skin graft didn’t die completely. The doctor came in and debrided (the nurse called it “debraded”) as much of the dead skin as he could get off, and they told me to make another appointment for next Monday to do it again. I am relieved, though, that while unpleasant, this will not affect how my nose looks in the end. The nurse said that without the skin graft, even if it had died, my nose would heal with a deformity, the nostril being pulled up.
It took me a lot of last week to get my Christmas tree all the way down. Since it was too dry and too tall and fat to pull through the front door, we ended up cutting its top off right in the living room and taking it out in pieces. Then, we did what we usually do with it, which is to drag it to the edge of our side yard, where there is a steep slope, and heave it over. I was able to find all of the ornaments I knew were missing, all the ornaments, I hope.
Oddly enough, I have two topics about breakfast this week. First, is bagels. Since we moved here, we have been unable to find decent bagels to eat. There is a bagel store in Vancouver, but its bagels are far too bready. They don’t have the texture of proper bagels. So, for the past couple years, we’ve had a subscription to Zabar’s in New York to send us bagels every four months. It’s a stretch to eat them all before the next shipment comes (we slice them and freeze them), since I only can eat a half a day because of the calories, and I don’t eat them that often. However, it’s nice to have a supply of decent bagels. In Austin, we would buy them at Einstein’s a few times a year.
In any case, back in the winter our Visa card was somehow hacked, so we had to replace it. I got a notice in December that our Zabar’s order had not shipped, and it was because I’d forgotten to replace the credit card. I did that, but I didn’t notice that they don’t take Discover, and for some reason, the software interface accepted my change instead of telling me they didn’t accept it. Then I pressed the Ship Now button as instructed. A few weeks later, I realized that my order hadn’t arrived, so I called and found out I had to change the card again. But our bagels still didn’t arrive. The post office tracking number only showed them being delivered somewhere in New York. And I have to say, our postal service sucks right now. I just found out a few days ago that a Christmas card I sent out in early December didn’t arrive in Canada until late January. In any case, it being only a little over a month before our next Zabar’s order arrives, when I called about the order, we decided to cancel it. About a week later, the order actually arrived, and although I had to throw out some bagels because they were moldy, after freezing and toasting, the others taste all right.
It seems clear to me that the idea is to make the post office perform badly so that it is privatized. The Austin transit people did the same thing to get rid of its free trolleys. First, they changed the schedule to cut down its routes from three to one, and then they “improved” the service by making it go every 10 minutes instead of every 30 so that half the time no one was on any of the trolleys. Then they got rid of it because “no one is riding it.” I’m sure the plan here is to make everyone so fed up with the post office that we don’t object when it is turned over to a private company. Then, like the train service in England, it’ll become more expensive and even more crappy. I know our new president has a lot to do to get this country running better again, but I hope he doesn’t forget the post office. Our Netflix disks used to take two days to get here, and now they take more like ten. Even though we only have the two-a-month subscription, it is sometimes difficult to get the first one back in time to get the second one before our month starts back up again. I still maintain this subscription even though we are also streaming, because there are so many things that are not available on streaming but are available on disk.
Cherry scones with clotted cream and cherry preserves. Yummy! Along with my elephant cup full of coffee.
But back to breakfast and my picture for the week. I have a couple of different friends who have been posting pictures on Facebook of their breakfasts, well, in one case of everything he cooks. These friends are both into presentation much more than I am, but I made some scones one morning and had them for breakfast with clotted cream and jam, and I thought they looked pretty good. So, I posted them on Facebook and here they are. I’m really grasping for a picture this week, obviously. I know scones aren’t a traditional breakfast, but I felt like having them. The coffee in this picture is in my elephant cup, which was given to me by a dear friend I’ve lost touch with. I hope she might see this and get back in touch with me.
As for the rest of the week, well, on Wednesday Maja and I finally went for a hike. I think it was the first time she could come since early December, possibly November. I hope we can get back to a regular walk or hike. I wanted to keep it gentle because the week before I hadn’t been allowed any exercise at all. So, we just did three miles at Moulton Falls Park, which is nearby and nearly flat. Luke, of course, came too. It wasn’t the nicest of days, which was unfortunate, because last week we had several really nice days, sunny and cold.
In fact, we were promised snow, and we got some. However, it was supposed to be snowy Sunday through Wednesday. That didn’t quite pan out. It snowed Sunday, and although it snowed most of the day, it was warm out, so we didn’t get much accumulation and it was gone by the next day. We got some snow over a couple of hours yesterday, enough so that it stuck right away. However by evening it was gone. It was supposed to snow all night, but it did not. So, no pretty photos of the snow for you this week. Instead, it is forecast for two days next week. I am wondering if we’ll ever get good and cold this winter. I have only worn my warm winter flannel nightgowns one week so far. They are too warm for the temperatures we’ve been having at night, so I keep returning to my cotton fall nightgowns. It seems weird to know that Austin, which hardly got any snow for the 30 years I lived there, has had more snow this winter than we have.
The only other thing we did this week was both take Luke to Doggy Day Care on Thursday so that we could go to Costco after dropping him off and then run other errands. We bought Luke some marrow bones at a little butcher shop out in the country on the way back from Costco. We stopped by the credit union to deposit our stimulus money, which we finally got (although a rather skimpy check, I thought—they must still think we were rich in 2019). And we stopped at the farm store to buy dog food and fire starting stuff. And finally at the produce market to buy meat and veggies.
Monday night we had an odd thing happen. A process server stopped by trying to serve papers to our former tenant, who hasn’t lived here for five years. Wayne was all inclined to be helpful, but I remembered that process serving is usually for something unpleasant, so I just told the guy he moved out five years ago. It was truly strange to have someone drive up to our house at about nine PM at night. Luke, who usually barks at everything, was so sacked out by then that he didn’t even notice the car until I said to Wayne, “Someone just drove up the driveway.” Then, of course, we had to restrain him to open the door. We just don’t usually have anyone coming here except our relatives and sometimes the mail lady.
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