Saturday, November 19, 2022

Fixing Solar Leaks, Getting Nuked & Shot, Pumping & Putting

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

11/19/22

Aloha All  --

This is the week before Thanksgiving and the beginning of the season of my discombobulation.  Actually it started for me before Halloween when the Christmas decorations were first displayed in the big box stores and with the arrival at Lowe's of the first mainland Christmas trees yesterday. The holidays are a mixed bag for me -- I like the warm fuzzies and all, but there's always been something unsettling and a little depressing about this time of year for me, also.  Regardless of my party-pooper attitude, I do hope you have a good Thanksgiving next week.

I started and ended the week with medical procedures, something that seems to be happening more and more these days.  Last Saturday was my visit to the eye doctor, and although I did have an injection, my right retina is doing much better and this was more to head off a relapse.  My doc is really good at jabbing needles in people's eyeballs, and it went very well, with only a brief and moderate discomfort from the injection and little aftereffects later.  This should hold me for at least a couple of months, maybe longer.  Then on Thursday I got a call from the hacked radiology clinic saying they were back online and were able to schedule my chest ct for Friday! Wow, this was much sooner that I expected given the backlog they must have had.  So I was nuked yesterday morning and I will pick up the report later today. I'll let you know the outcome next week.

Badbadbad
My big house project this week was repairing a couple of leaks that I discovered in our solar system that produces hot water for our pool.  As is often the case when you do your own house repairs, you discover that the original installation was -- to put it charitably -- not exactly the best job.  I've already had to work on this system to replace pipe and fittings that were the wrong kind and failed prematurely.  The panels themselves are ok, it's the stuff the installers added that was the problem.  I think it was either a matter of trying to save money, or that the right materials weren't available.  Anyway,  fixing the latest problems required cutting out two
Much mo' betta!

sections and replacing them with more durable parts that should have been used in the first place.  There are several more spots where this might have to been done also, but I'll wait.  The job required getting up on the roof several times, and re-learning how to glue ABS pipe and fittings.  So far it looks like I succeeded, kind of a Geezer macho high.

I mentioned last week my recent tendency to either play golf once a week or go to the gym, but not both.  Well, on Sunday Karen wanted to go the the gym and then on Thursday I also played golf with her.  Whew!  Note, this is in the context of my physical exertion of fixing the solar system.  I'm paying for this wanton exhibition of the geezer syndrome "brain-is-willing-but-the-body-says-WTF?!" with sore muscles, stiff joints, and extra naps.

Ok.  Off to market and beach.  Note -- no snow shoveling. Stay well.

2 comments:

Coleen Hanna said...

You may have heard about WNY being slammed with, in places, 5-6 feet of lake effect snow. Sounds tough, I know, but I revel in it. Today I woke up to sun and a true winter wonderland. With cabin fever setting in after two days, I strapped on my snowshoes and took myself around our village for about two hours. With a driving ban, I had the roads to myself. I met lots of people along the way, smiling and friendly. This is the life! I know, to each her own. By March I will be dreaming of Hawaii.

Richard Sherman said...

I have some fond memories of snow in Ohio. Our house backed up onto some woods into which we had cut a small clearing. I would sit on top of the heat vent in front of our glass sliding doors with our cat watching the snow falling -- creating, as you say, a winter wonderland. I also liked walking in the woods during a snowstorm when it was wonderfully quiet and emotionally soothing.

But then the other memories kick in -- shoveling my driveway over and over, bitter cold, a case of pneumonia once, a touch of frostbite or two, and the rusted-out bottom of my little pickup from the highway salt.

Maybe the bottom line is that our experiences of nature are richly varied and personal, and can change over time as measured days, months and years. Embrace them regardless valence.