Holidaze Discombobulation Begins

 [Note: This is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland.]

11/27/21

Aloha All!  

Hau'oli La Pelehu! (Happy Thanksgiving!)  Funny note:  in Hawaiian, "pelehu" means puffed up or swollen, so the phrase is literally, "Happy Swollen Day."  Seems right to me...

Hope you all had a nice Thanksgiving.  Ours was pretty good.  It was a pot luck at a neighbor's house.  My fears about too much togetherness were only partly realized.  There were about 20 people but we

Dinner Guests Arriving

ate on an open-air lanai well spread out.  The real test will come in about a week, however, when the virus will have had time to do its deed.  I'll let you know.  The new variant that has been identified in South Africa sounds scary, but we need much more data before assessing how bad it will be. Mutations occur when there are lots of vulnerable targets to infect, and unvaccinated people are indeed vulnerable. Cases that occur in those who are vaccinated reach the same level of viral load as unvaccinated, but the data show the amount of the virus declines much more quickly.  This means, of course, that those who choose not to get the vaccine are contributing to the emergence of problematic variants and thereby prolonging and worsening this sh*t show.

Karen and I played golf on Wednesday instead of our usual Tuesday and opted to forgo our weekly Planet Fitness workout altogether.  Wednesday's round continued my slide toward mediocrity -- no pars, no bogeys, no birdies, no skittles, no wigglies, no banshees this time.  Actually I did ok, and hit quite a few good tee shots, but I wasn't all that consistent on the follow up shots.  Karen again got a par and several bogeys. Karen's golf buddy may be available again soon, so I may be taking a break for a while.  That's ok by me.  I've really enjoyed the outings but I definitely resisted getting totally hooked on the game.

Received my replacement skylight opener and installed it on Thanksgiving day.  Wow, what a difference!  I put the new mechanism on the heaviest of the two skylights and it is now much, much easier to open.  I'll put the one it replaced on the other skylight which right now has the defective unit. This will require a visit by my handyman to help move our heavy dining room table top so that we can set up a ladder underneath it, probably next week some time.  So far I consider the whole project a definite success.

Well, as I've mentioned in previous years, I have mixed feelings about the holidays.  I've begun putting up outside decorations and lights, and maybe tomorrow we'll get out our artificial tree.  It's a bit disheartening though to be bombarded with the commercial hype of buy, buy, buy.  This year we started to see Christmas stuff in the stores before Halloween! And the Black Friday sales seem to now go on for weeks.  I try to ignore as much of it as I can, and to avoid going to some of the shopping centers unless absolutely necessary until after January 1.  Oh, and the tv schedule is all messed up with Christmas specials and football games taking the place of my favorite shows.  Bah, humbug!  Occasionally, though, the true spirit of the season breaks through and I get the warm fuzzies, so I don't feel entirely like the Grinch. 

Good news on the medical front.  I saw my retinal doctor yesterday and I got another reprieve from an eyeball jab.  That makes 2 1/2 months since the last injection.  My next appointment will be in 6 weeks, so if I hold out until then it will be a record interval of 4 months!  Although I was able to deal with injections every 4-6 weeks, it certainly is a relief to go this long between them.  My acuity in the bad eye hasn't improved much (20/80 to 20/100) and never will most likely.  But if it will stay where it is and my left eye remains at 20/20, I can deal with it.

Ok. Off for our usual Saturday morning routine.  A welcome antidote to Holidaze Discombobulation. Take care, enjoy the season as much as you can, try to stay sane and healthy.