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The day started out without me being able to sleep in the morning. I was up at 5AM and started my day early (Today, I slept late!). I wrote the blog and did all the morning things.

Breakfast is low-fat cottage cheese and canned peaches. This is a perfect match to all my restrictions, and I like it too.

We received a package at our door from DHL that was an address a mile away. Once in a while, we get packages that we have to redeliver on the street. So I thought it was that at first, I drove to the other side of Clarion Street and discovered the address did not exist. So I read the whole address and put it in Air Volvo navigation, drove the mile to the location, and delivered the package.

There was nobody home, and the doorbell was the type that records video. I hope that the recipient does not turn me in for stealing a package as the video shows me, a stranger, handling a package!

I drove out from there to Susie in Forest Grove. The drive to Forest Grove Rehab and Care Center was without events. After that little event, I was even more tired and was a few minutes late at 10ish. Susie was in a dark room, warm and very much asleep.

I was tired already, and my incisions were sore from the drive. Susie can barely speak and falls asleep but is happy to see me. I do a short FaceTime call with Leta and Sarah, one of the nurses, get a bit of FaceTime with Leta. Leta had spoken to Sarah a few times, and they were both happy to see each other.

I am there for 90 minutes. Then, finally, I am getting fatigued and have to leave before I am too tired to drive. So I kiss Susie goodbye. Physical Therapy shows up and is apparently still working with Susie as I go. So that is good news, but I still leave as I do not want to take a nap in the car and then drive home!

Lunch is reheated spaghetti and meat sauce from the previous delivery. It is again better reheated the next day. I am tired, not quite stumbling tired, but I am careful. More Pirate Movies this afternoon. My fav is number 3, and I am halfway through it. I watch it and fall asleep after it.

As usual, I watch some YouTube while eating. Today, I watched part 7 of building a wooden ship model, the USS Albatross. I have subscribed to a perfectly executed channel where he just works and records each build step with a narration of why he does something. This is one of my secrets to painting figures and building models; I look up how others did the work and pick and choose what I will do. It is also why I do not buy more models–I see the amount of time to finish a model and will not pre-invest now.

Aside: The famous (and sunken) U.S. WW2 Lexington CV-2 is one of the pre-investments. It is impossible to find a plastic model in a 1/350 scale (that makes it over two feet long!). The story was told to me, a person with hoarding passed away, and the local hobby store bought the unopened models from the family. Thus, a copy of the long out of print model was there to buy in the Hillsboro hobby store at a reasonable price. I watched a video of the build of the model, it is a flawed kit, and I have not been ready to start it. Someday!

Note: One of my investment book purchases is the story of the USS Lexington CV-2 told by a reporter on the ship for its very short life in WW2. It is a signed copy from 1946. One of the best WW2 naval stories I have read: Queen of the Flattops. The author spent the war selling the book and bonds for the war after surviving the sinking of the Lexington. In secret, Stanley Johnston, the author, was tried for printing that the Imperial Japanese codes were broken in his war dispatches in the Chicago Tribune. Apparently, the Imperial Japanese Navy did not read the Chicago Tribune and never learned that their codes were broken during the war. The Chicago Tribune was shuttered (it was an anti-FDR paper) for part of the war. Mr. Johnston was found not guilty on a technicality. The book has no mention of code-breaking.

Charlette Jackson, from church, calls, and she delivers a beautiful chicken tortilla soup for my dinner. I have two bowls!

I watch some of the news on PBS until the rehash of 6Jan2021 starts. I remember the events, and having lived in Washington, D.C. area; I was very sad as I loved the U.S. Capital and the kind police force. I turned off the T.V.

I went and read the rest of Death on the Nile. Barb, Susie’s sister, reminded me that it is coming out in a new movie soon. I think it is a dark story and one of Agatha Christie’s best. She writes all you know to solve it, but it is in her detective’s words, “impossible.” All with tourists in the 1930s on the Nile. Excellent!

I talk to Subha from Nike, she calls between her meetings. I give her my sympathy; she lost her father when all my chaos started for me. So it was good to talk to her; I am so glad she called.

I talk to folks on the phone but stay in bed reading and napping. I finally take my last pills and fall asleep near 11ish.

Starting with the most essential item, Susie was better this Tuesday morning. I managed to get to Forest Grove Rehab and Care Center about 9:30 and was in Susie room, 44A, a bit later after the staff got her dressed. The lead nurse for Susie, Pre, told me and some of the nursing aids too that Susie is not going to a sleep study today. Pre informed me the doc had ordered it, but she delayed it. We both agreed more needles and tests were not what we needed.

Returning to Susie’s room, I spent the morning opening Christmas cards; I saved them for now and read them to Susie. I told Susie about the last few days. She could only get a few words out. I got some thickened water, Susie must have only thick liquids now, and the water helped her speech. It was still hard to understand her, but she was more clear.

I called Susie’s mother Leta and Dr. Peter Koper and we did FaceTime. Later, Susie had some food when Zoriada also stopped by. A busy day for Susie. A better day.

Another important detail is that my doctor meeting with the cancer folks is tomorrow in Portland at the Knight Cancer Center branch. There we will decide the next steps for me. Chemo, type of drugs to be used, and all that is Thursday morning at 10:30. I am considering delaying any chemo for a few months to get my strength back and to get hospice started for Susie. I will work with the docs at Knight Cancer Center for all of this.

Lastly, on important items, the Mac I am using totally crashed last night. I had to reload the OS! I am now using Monterey, 12.1, and the computer is currently working (except for the mic). I was up to 11:30 reloading it. I thought I would have to reload all my data from my backup; I have Apple’s Time Machine running using a super-fast solid-state external drive with the MacBook Pro (13″ M1) connected by USB-C to a landing dock from OWC. The OWC landing dock was expensive but supplies seamless access to the backup drive with more USB-C plugs, supplies high watts for the power for the Mac, legacy USB ports, and even a network port. The M1-based new Mac does not support anything except WiFi connections for the network! Returning to the crash, I was surprised that everything recovered, and there was no need to rebuild my Mac. I was able to sleep after running Word and seeing that my documents were still available.

The only scary thing was that the Mac needed to do a complete backup to recover into Monterrey, but that was completed without issue last night. Please note, with the OWC landing doc, I never miss a backup. I just plug in the MacBook Pro into the power from the landing dock and that connects my Time Machine drive and the next backup happens in a few minutes. I do have to manually eject the drive when I unplug the Mac, but I have now developed that habit. Failing to eject the drive gets me a nasty message and can corrupt the backup if in progress and require clearing the Time Machine–had that happen once, not a good thing. Thusly, I eject the backup drive when I grab my Mac.

Starting back, I was up at 6:30ish. I made coffee, had breakfast of low-fat cottage cheese and canned fruit (sticking to my post-surgery diet), and read and cleared my email. I wrote the blog, a bit sad this time with Susie fading, and then showered and cleaned up.

I was fatigued a bit after doing all of that. However, I managed to safely drive to the nursing home. I would need to rest after the trip.

I managed 90 minutes and was relieved when Anne Weld-Martin came in after 11. I also spoke to Pre and will begin hospice for Susie next week. This would likely bring Susie home with lots of reasonable care, Pre suggested. They are happy to care for her in Forest Grove, but hospice seems the next logical step. I agreed with Pre. Pre and I also decided next week would be the soonest to do this; I still am weak from the surgery.

I got home and stripped the bed, and started the wash. I opened a can of clam chowder for lunch, got it hot on the stove, and watched a few videos on YouTube. Finally, I got some blankets, sat in Susie’s favorite chair in the living room, and fell asleep.

I awoke and decided to try a bit more driving and drove to the hobby store and back. I was tired and did not buy anything at Tammy’s Hobby store. The magazine I like, Fine Modeller, was still in the current issue I had already read.

Back to the chair and the sheets now in the dryer. I decided to continue through the pirate movies. So I put on the second Pirates of the Caribbean movie. This one, as I remembered from my first viewing it (we used to have a tradition that the Smiths, the Wilds, and Michael Giessner would watch the newest Pirate movie together), was a bit forced with weak transitions, but still fun. I watched the whole film and then fell asleep again.

Dinner was a repeat from Pastaghetti delivered by GrubHub. The chicken breast parmesan is breaded and covered with sauce and cheese and seems to work for me. I also ordered a portion of spaghetti in meat sauce (my diet is beef only ground and broken up). I had only a bit of the spaghetti, saving most for lunch on Wednesday. I also ordered a meal for Corwin as he was in this evening.

I started the third Pirate movie, my fav, in which I think the actors and directors find their footing and introduce more mythology and more pirates. Even the Disney ride’s first drop is sort of explained in the movie; I only manage 1/2 of the film.

I remade the bed; my incisions are now sorer these days, and the stretching required to make the bed was, while not difficult, more painful than usual. I picked up the Agatha Christie book, Murder on the Nile, and almost slept. I then got up, took my last pills, and discovered the Mac was dying.

I remembered rolling over a few times once in bed near 11:30ish, reading more, and then a deep sleep came (until 5:00ish).

The day started with the iPhone waking me at 7ish and me rolling over for a bit. The morning was then rushed, like before my surgery, with email and coffee and then writing the blog. I was not tired this morning which was a new feeling.

I logged on to the shoeccompany, finding my password on a piece of paper, and reset my out-of-office and doing my timesheet. I was relieved it took only a short while to get this done.

I managed to be dressed and left about 10ish. My first time driving Air Volvo since my surgery. I had planned to wait for the whole two weeks after my surgery, but Susie was reported fading at the nursing home, so I had to start a day early. I found that I had no issues getting into Air Volvo and starting the trip.

My incisions did start to be pulled a bit from driving until later and on the way back. I had no issues getting to the Forest Grove Rehab and Care Center about 11ish and made my way to Susie’s room, 44A; I did have to follow all the procedures, including getting my temperature checked.

Susie was sleeping, and it was hard to wake her up at first. She was delighted to see me, but she was clearly not really able to wake up. She tried to speak, but only a few words, and those were not clear.

I checked with her nurses, and she told me that Susie is not eating any more; the nurse cried. She also told me that Susie is staying hydrated by drinking water and is comfortable. The nurse went on to say with damp eyes to say that Susie was very sweat and would say, “I can see you” when sitting with her but Susie did not eat for the last few days.

I checked Susie’s vitals, and they are normal.

I brought Susie some of her mail. She got some little gloves and a small dream catcher from the American Indian kids she supports. I put the gloves under her tree, still lighted, and hung the dream catcher on the wall. Then, I watered the plants and stayed with Susie for about an hour. I was very fatigued by then. I called using FaceTime so Susie could see and chat with her mother and Dr. Peter Koper.

I managed not to cry, except for a few damp eye moments with the nurse and when saying goodbye.

I was distraught in the car sitting in the parking lot, cried, and got calm enough to drive. The visit brought back all the pain of Susie’s illness. I had moved Susie’s challenges to the back of my mind while I endured the prep, surgery, hospital stay, and recovery. Now it was back and painful.

I drove home. I chatted with Anne Weld-Martin sitting in another parking lot, and we agreed to visit Susie on Tuesday. I would be there about 10ish, and Anne would be there about 11ish. We would likely overlap.

I did drive-through and got Popeye’s fried chicken and coleslaw. However, I did eat only 1/2 of the coleslaw. While chicken is on my food list, I’m not sure that meant fried chicken, but I felt like I needed more calories of late. So, I watched some YouTube videos on shipwrecks (recommended video on shipwrecks)  and from Nerd of the Rings while eating.

I finished the book Certain Dark Things this morning. I highly recommend the modern vampire story. It is the best story I have read since the first book of the Twilight books (I only liked the first one).

I fell dead asleep in the chair.

Groceries were delivered, and I put them away. Trying not to lift too much weight, 20 pounds being my limit. But, Safeway did not have celery or eggs noodles. So, I text Corwin to get some.

After waking, I put on the rest of the new Matrix movie (I watched the first 1/2 a few days ago), available for no additional cost on HBOMax, and fell asleep again (turning off the film before I slept).

Corwin finally appeared with the supplies after I awoke and finished the Matrix movie for the second time. It is still good, and I recommend it. It is the movie that should have been the third film.

Corwin takes over for me in the kitchen, cleaning it up, chopping stuff. I boil the noodles (Corwin filling the pan for me), cook the celery and onion in a frying pan before mixing all the things together to make an old-style Tuna Noodle Casserole. I even crush potato chips over it. Dondrea inspired me to make this after a chat last week.

It is bubbling after 40 minutes at 350F, and we have some. It is a bit flat to my taste, but I have three bowls as I am famished. Again, the effects of the healing process.

From the same director as the new Matrix movie, I watched a favorite of mine while eating that is considered one of the worst made movies, Jupiter Raising. However, I still like it, and while Corwin panned the acting, I still thought it fun (but overly predictable).

I am tired and a bit sore. The incisions now hurt, and I am stiff. I managed to get to bed about 11ish, not sure where all the time went, and fell asleep quickly. I awake at 3ish but decide against pain killers, getting up just does appeal, at 4ish and sleep some more.

Again, this is really just a short note as I spent most of the day resting.

I decided that I could stand the non-New York City bagels and was up early as I could not sleep. My feet hurt from cold, but this was not really the case. Since I had cancer-caused anemia, I had found myself freezing when I was perfectly warm. Only movement can change fix this. So I, not really wanting to do it, was up early, 5:30ish, on Sunday. I can tell that the slow bleeding is gone as I do not have that strange feeling of suddenly freezing and getting tired–sort of freezing to death in a warm house–from worsening anemia.

After the surgery and reaching the immediate intervention of anemia, transfusion, I had additional electrolytic imbalances that required lots of pills and infusions when I was in the hospital. Some are solved others are improving. Being a computer expert, I managed to survive the year primarily by using the magical brews universally known by computer people to solve most health issues: Coffee and good quality tea.

I ordered a bad breath bagel, smoked salmon with capers and veggies over cream cheese, and a dozen bagels for later use this week (like this Monday morning) with smear from our local Einstein Brothers Bagels delivered by DoorDash. I did see that the bagel folks, likely due to the pandemic and the resultant worker shortage, changed their hours to be open at 8AM. So I did wait for bagels.

Now awake, email processed, and pain gone from anemia caused cold, I turned to BBC America for entertainment. Top Gear with the new hosts was on–a catch-up on Sunday. I watched three episodes of the revised show while waiting for DoorDash. Years ago, I would slip out of bed and watch Top Gear on Sunday morning while Susie would sleep in. Bagels arrived in the second episode.

I tried, thinking my turn to add more live veggies to my diet, left the onion and tomato on the bagel. Unfortunately, the red onion did not work for me. I did manage the thin tomato slice. It was terrific, but I still missed NYC and Zabar’s near 79th Street Station.

Top Gear was not as funny, nor was the hosts willing to risk their lives like the previous now fired and off-air hosts. I also missed running different car models on the track and getting a proper reading of the worth of multi-million dollar (pounds in the British show) cars. But, once I got used to the new format, I did like it.

I edited another Howard story, his Christmas 2016 story. I was surprised by how harsh and forced the writing was. I wrote it mainly as a Christmas Card to my fellow Call of Cthulhu Role-playing game players. I remember that I wrote it after taking Amtrack to Michigan from Oregon–a total fail as far as I was concerned (no more long train trips for me). I wrote it between the Michigan 2016 Christmas events and our return by train (almost worse than the trip out).

Mariah called, and she wished to watch some football and then maybe visit Powell’s. So I dressed and got ready. Removing the bandage in the process and discovering no bleeding and thus just a clean shirt. Excellent!

I took a short nap while Mariah traveled. It is still a lot of work to get going for me. This Sunday morning, I could skip the blog as I had done two days the night before, staying up late to finish it (make the early morning more painful). But, I still was tired out by dressing and getting started so early.

We watched football with the sound off; Mariah does not care for the commentary. Mariah played professional women’s football and does not need the analysis of the TV hosts. As Portland’s soccer team fans would call Seattle, the northern small fishing village unsurprisingly won again a clearly weaker team. I do like the Seahawks and cannot help but cheer for them softly.

We left before Mariah, who used out washer and drier instead of rising Covid and wasting a vast amount of quarters on the supplied machines at her apartment, put her clothing in the drier. So off to Powells, my first excursion in more than a week.

It was busy, being the last holiday shopping night, and I did wander through the SciFi section looking at what was labeled as new. Unfortunately, the fatigue returned, and I had to sit for a while, and the magic of the books failed to get me to buy, unusual for me. Some new cookbooks, drink books (Death & Co.), and Pacific Northwest culture books might get purchased in the future.

I was happy to travel again. I was tired after that. Mariah collected her now clean clothing headed out.

I called about Susie at Forest Grove Rehab and Care Center (room 44A) and spoke to her nurse. Susie is having more trouble eating and drinking and seemed distracted today.

I felt terrible that Susie was so alone, but my exhaustion was back, and other events (details about some of my recovery do not need to be discussed here) made me sure I should wait another day. Mariah offered to drive me to see Susie, but I was sure it was unwise. I needed another day.

I ordered two pizzas for the game, Chicken with some veggies on a white sauce for me. After that, I was stuffed and had a cupcake and later peanut butter toast (white bread only) for dinner.

I called Kate Rosenburg from Nike, and we talked about Nike politics and what I should expect from the short-term disability payments and process. Messy would best describe the process as Kate explained her experiences.

I finally went to bed and read. Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s  Certain Dark Things (English) is hard to put down. It is predictable, but the vampires, Mexico City, and the Neon Noir are just fun. Highly recommended!

I had trouble sleeping, as usual now, but slept sometime after midnight. Kink.FM is back to playing two hours of Afterdark music on Sunday night. So I rested to that music and then turned off at midnight.

Again, I am just resting, so it is hard to find a story to share.

Today, working backward, was the annual (or so) special for Doctor Who. Jodie Whittaker is leaving the role, the first woman to play the Doctor, and there is still no information on the next Doctor. This is her full last episode, and thus I could not miss it.

I was expecting something great. I had some trouble loving today’s episode as I have seen much better work for the year-end with Matt Smith’s Doctor doing the best one, I think Christmas Carol. But, Peter Capaldi’s Last Christmas is creepy, and I remember on its release being scared and happy at the same time–this is considered the best one by more official sources. The one today was not even close in quality to these shows. Not sure what will be the future of Doctor Who. Corwin commented that their budget must have been cut when watching the episode. Not great.

Today, I read a bit of the rules to play a solo role-playing game, Thousand Year Old Vampire. I have had a physical copy of the game for some time. I was hoping to try it one of these days while I am just sitting around.

Before this, I taught Corwin how to play The Lost Ruins of Arnak, a fav board game of mine. Corwin scored well for his first game, but, as usual with this game, a play gets you to understand the process but not a win. However, Corwin did like the game, and it played fast and took less than 90 minutes to play.

The game is themed on a 1920s Hollywood version of archeology. The mechanics are a well-balanced mix of deck building, resource discovery and management, and a racing board to score most points (representing your research and capturing vital knowledge to discover the lost city’s secrets before your competition beats you to publish). Also, The theme is not too abstract, so you can imagine putting on a hat and whip and digging to find the secrets of Arnak!

I bought some replacement parts this holiday for the game while recovering, and they were delivered before Christmas. So my new coins and tiny compasses got their first use today. I was happy to finally replace the paper coins (I like the feel of metal coins when I play a board game), and I liked the look of the tiny compasses stacked in your resources (representing maps and location information). Cool!

This is the first game I have played since the surgery, and I was happy to not become fatigued while setting up or playing the game.

Dinner was grilled cheese (cheddar) on white bread. Something simple. Of course, I used the pan Rev. Wolff sent me and fried the sandwiches in butter. I cover the pan with a lid and add a bit of water to let the hot steam (remember steam is over 212F) heat the sandwich through and melt the cheese. Cut into quarters; it makes a nice bite.

Before dinner, I called the Forest Grove Rehab and Care Center to see how Susie was doing. They told me she was doing fine, and I asked them to say to her a Happy New Year from me. They were a bit stressed; they are short-staffed (like everywhere), but they usually lean on the weekends and holidays.

I am afraid before this, I bored Corwin with the first Pirate of the Caribbean movie. I wanted to see if it was still good. I still liked it.

I also edited a Howard story today. I was feeling up to some mental work, so I corrected a few typos in the first story; it is always a surprise to find more typos as I wrote it on a plane back in 2017. My last edit for this story, not surprising, was early 2021. Apparently, I had some spare time last New Year’s weekend.

The first and last Howard stories are done, I think. There are four other stories I will have to fix up. I started a new story based on my time in New York City and hope to find the energy to finish it.

I got dressed in the afternoon, not wanting another day where I did not get dressed.

Before that, I had leftover lasagna from Rajesh, an excellent late lunch. Of course, Italian-styled food is always better the next day. Rajesh had suggested it needed more salt, but, as Corwin and Mariah can attest, I never cook with salt, and my food always needs salt. So for me, it was perfect.

I had slept until about 9:30, missing my usual wake-up at 4ish to take more painkillers.

Moving to the previous day, still going backward, I managed to sleep on New Year’s Eve after midnight, about 2ish. The locals like to set off loud illegal fireworks for the Year-End. The house was not quite shaking with explosions, but one or two did startle me–it was a lot of pyrotechnics.

I went to bed before the year changed and read more about Mexican Vampires. I love the book by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Certain Dark Things (English). I showered just before bed and changed into sleeping clothing. I had to be careful as I staggered a bit. I kept my hand on the new hand bars in the new shower!

I managed to not dress the whole day, and Rajesh from Nike brought me lasagna for dinner, plus a dessert from B.J. Brewhouse (a giant cookie with ice cream). Before that,  I felt the exhaustion from my surgery and just sat in my chair and took it very slowly.

Lunch was leftover spaghetti and meat sauce from the previous order from GrubHub, and it too was better the second reheat.

I was up late after 10AM, with the 4AM wake-up for pain killers needed.