Friday Getting Back Into Home

Some of the sadness of ending a trip, and I started finding my way back into living at home.

I sold my shares in L3Harris to pay bills. This is some of the cash I parked in the market. I was not expecting a 60% return, nor did I expect Trump to start a war, or that I would hold stock in the main supplier of rocket engines for missiles at the same time. I am an accidental war profiteer! This will cover some bills as I wait for Social Security payments, which will start in June. The SS payments do not cover all my expenses, but they will help.

I connected with my health care providers, who have now worked out something, and I can now use the usual place for my CT Scan (not driving into Washington State!), checking that the colon cancer is still gone. I called, and I am off to Legacy Good Samaritan next Thursday morning. Excellent. I also looked at the risks of the non-cancerous tumor in my neck and decided to put that off until it becomes a problem. The risk profile versus the gain seemed out of proportion. I will instead monitor it. I am down to getting some blood work done and a colonoscopy to schedule.

The skin rash is slowly returning, suggesting that Shyrizi is working. I have not returned to the creams yet. It is an interesting process. I do feel like a “test bunny.”

I reheated the remaining coffee and cut some ham and cheese (from the fromage counter at The Market of Choice). I sliced up some bread I bought (but it was too soft for my taste), and with a banana, that was my breakfast. It reminds me of European and Icelandic breakfasts. I ate that while I wrote the blog.

I also updated my transactions in Quicken, read (mostly deleted) email, and doom scrolled the NYT. My IRA investments could not decide whether there was a crisis with Iran and stayed static. I also read that the fired US Navy Secretary lost his job by not meeting the deadlines for the President’s Battleship design. It reminds me of the story of the Kaiser sending in his design for a new cruiser for the German Imperial Navy: “Very pretty, but it won’t float,” was the navy’s reaction. Hmmm. Interesting to watch for us amateur battleship historians.

The blog was finished mid-morning. I was writing slowly, and I had no plans. I got a postcard out to Mom Wild as promised, St. Louis Arc postcards so far.

I reheated the pizza (not that good) for lunch. It seemed better reheated. I watched more Star Trek Academy while I ate. I then collected my Greek Bible and my NRSV Bible from college (and carried it to the site of ancient Megiddo once, and read the passage about the death of Josiah at the gate of Megiddo, standing in the remains of the gate). I headed to Insomnia Coffee nearby and started on my homework for my Sunday School Class.

I spent two hours working on class notes on teaching the beginning of The Book of Revelation. I started to recall my Greek and Biblical Criticism (this is about the Greek words and their variations found in the early witnesses to the original text, not about being critical of the New Testament from a religious point of view). I assembled a lesson with notes and text to read. I usually go with the NRSV (New Revised Standard Version) rather than the NIV (New International Version) for the New Testament, as I find that the sentences in the NRSV often flow closer to the underlying Greek. NIV rewrites the text for clarity, but I believe they have then mixed in the translator’s political and religious views into the translation. But I understand that the NIV works well for those with weaker reading or language skills. It is more a matter of taste, and I suspect (with my pencil/pen corrections in the NRSV written in my copy), I will never be happy with either version.

It is slow going as I relearn some Greek, but the Internet is very helpful, and soon I can find details I would otherwise have to search for in books. I also learned that my 3rd Edition Greek New Testament has been replaced by the 5th Edition. After some thinking, I ordered a 5th Edition (the 6th is coming out in September). I also have a book that explains choices made in the official Greek version when there are conflicts in sources, and that too is being updated, but I think mine will be good enough (there are only two new sources and about 100 changes in the texts in the 6th Edition from mine, and often it is just wording on why it is still the same).

After hours of that, including a gluten-free coffee cake (lovely—I don’t usually go gluten-free, but it looked so good) and coffee, and using my new AirPods until they ran out of power, I headed back to the house. I defrosted a pork chop, found Trader Joe’s Four Cheese Scalloped Potatoes (not recommended), and chopped and microwaved fresh carrots with butter and some salt (I use unsalted butter). I fried the pork chop with some Tuscan-style spices. Dinner was good. I ate it while I continued watching Star Trek Academy and enjoyed another episode (no spoilers).

At 7ish, Corwin called. He got paid for his new limo driving job and wanted to celebrate. I would go for a drink and dessert. We headed around 8ish to the Golden Valley Brewery (GVB) and Corwin, using his gift card for Christmas, got a steak and an excellent dinner. I had an Old Fashioned and shared a cheesecake with Corwin. It was a nice dinner and chat.

We returned to the house in Air VW the Gray, he headed out, and soon I was headed to bed after reading for a while. I soon nodded off, trying to read a new book (I had forgotten about, found on the bookcase, unread). I turned off the light, woke once to prove hydration, and woke again with sunrise around 6.

Thanks for reading!