Sunday March 9 2008

Early Spring Evening

A good day, even prettier than yesterday. It's not supposed to storm again until Tuesday when we go back to Jackson. I've been delighting in watching that fox hunting mice in the field. Lots better than a TV program. He listens for the rodents under more than a foot of snow, and sneaks here and there stalking, tiptoeing, creeping, then leaps high in the air and dives headfirst after the meal. With the snow pretty crusty right now, it seems like the hunting might be a little difficult for the fox.

Jackie, Betty and Pat called this afternoon and sure enjoyed talking to them. Betty's flowers are beginning to bloom down there in Mesquite. Just hearing that kind of feels like a wisp of spring reaching up to us. I was glad to hear Pat's Fred is recuperating well from his knee surgery. And Jackie has good news about their kids being able to come back and work and live on the farm.

This afternoon that frosted up freezer kept calling me. I might have mentioned that Joe didn't get the door shut tight on it while I was gone and the freezer probably ran solid for two or three days before I found it. The door was pushed to, but not sealed. Everything was still frozen, but all frosted up. So today I defrosted that, cleaned it up and organized all the food. Well, that led to having to use some of the older stuff, so made a turkey noodle casserole, a blackberry pie, and 7 loaves of banana bread. I thought the batch would make 6 loaves, but got 7 out of the big bowl of batter.

That big crockery bowl was Joe's mother's and I used it all those years at the lodge and here at the ranch ever since. Couldn't stand to put those bananas back in the freezer, so the finished loaves will go in there instead and be handy to take out every so often. They are in the oven now and hopefully they will turn out o.k. as I skimped down on the oil and sugar to make them more healthy. It was either throw out the frozen leftover bananas or make something out of them. Betty opted for throwing out the bananas. She has been known to take home House on Muddy banana bread however.

I hate to waste food, but this time it was necessary to throw some of the old stuff out. Thought I could make chicken soup out of some August '06 thighs, but they went bye bye. We aren't eating much anymore, and I've been throwing out more food than I would like to lately. It will be necessary to have some self discipline and not to over buy stuff at the store, even if it IS on a really good bargain. This all seems to show some progress with my cleaning and purging. My pantry shelves are looking better too - no longer so crammed full and cluttery to where I don't even know what's in there. It's a good thing.

Masters of the American West show at the Autry National Heritage Center in L.A. - One of the best western shows in the country. I love the way this website works and the art is beautiful. Wait to look until you have time or come back several times to see it all, there is so much..

http://www.autrynationalcenter.org/masters2008/artists.php

Saturday March 8 2008

Betty's Horse

(Magpie on its back)

We've had a big red fox out hunting in our field for the last couple of evenings. Raven sure lets us know its there.. I'm not so sure I didn't see a wolf run across the road early one morning out near the creek on the way to Jackson. It was a very dark color, but disappeared so fast and at such a distance, it could have been a coyote. Just didn't look quite right though.

It's a warm, calm and sunny day. About 30 degrees in the shade as I write in the early afternoon. Those old Muddy Hills are turning more brown, as its finally warm enough to melt off some of the snow from the rocks. All the snow and ice has come off the roofs in the last several days. "Spring-like". At the moment anyway. This morning I've been thinking of spring cleaning and a mom and her daughter in Pinedale have started a house cleaning business, so I'm really considering having them come out when the weather gets good and cleaning each room top to bottom. I've never had a house cleaner in my life, so it's about time to experience that luxury. And the house does need a deep cleaning. That should let us easily just spiff things up ourselves for a year or so.

Took a walk down the road with the dogs. We went as far as out of the gate, a little more than a mile. That is the furthest I've gone, as yet. Was able to walk on a line of bare dirt for a lot of the way. And could smell that odor of damp spring earth. Got too warm on the way home even. Dogs had a great time. Very quiet and relaxed otherwise. Doing a little reading. Joe's watching basketball games.

Yesterday I got calls from Sheral - was sorry to learn she has been very sick -and Edis called too, so was glad to have a nice visit with her. They are looking for a new house there in Bozeman.

FEEL BETTER SOON, SHERAL.

.

Friday March 7 2008

From My Studio Window

18x24 oil painting

by Lynn Thomas

Click for details

SEVEN HORSES

Right now we have seven horses.
Frosty is my mare. She is about l5 and is an appaloosa.
Her color is grey roan with black spots

and a sparse mane and tail.
She has a big bump on her nose and between her ears.
Joe says I should wear a paper bag on my head when I ride her
so no one will know it is me because she is so ugly.
Before her I had a wonderful bay mare, Trixie,

but she’s gone now.
Joe’s horse is Ace, a brown and white pinto gelding

who is about 15.
His mother was a pinto POA and his father was a work horse.
They thought the two year old work stud

was too young to breed.
We got Ace as a catch colt.
We have a sorrel gelding, Brandy, who is almost 30.
He has been a wonderful horse
Especially when we were running

the dude string in the mountains.
He belongs to my daughter Beverly.
Debbie’s horse in those years was Brandy's sister, Ginger.
She died some years back. She was a good horse too.
They are pretty horses. And big.
Brandy, Ginger and Rosebud were from our Morgan mares
And a sheepherder’s big sorrel draft horse stud.
We put the mares and that stud together

several times after dark in the big meadow.
Daisy is a bay mare. The smallest of all our horses.
Her mother was April, an Arabian.
She is always good, but acts bad like her mother

as if she might want to throw you off,
She is just nervous and doesn't like flies.
Even when its not fly season she is afraid there might be flies.
She wants to be going and get the job done

and come back home.
She is getting old now, turning gray around her eyes.
Then we have Peanuts. Steady and faithful,
He is a buckskin gelding and getting old too.
We also have Sox and Bobbi.
Sox is Ginger's colt, but her quarter horse stud was high spirited
and we never could break her to ride safely. Joe tried.
Instead he broke her to work and pull the feed sled.
The same thing happened with her colt Bobbi.
They are both big sorrel mares with light manes and tails
and white stockings and blazes.
They would rather run than anything
and we had many runaways on the feedground.
We also are taking care of four of the lodge horses
who are old and need extra feed for the winter.
So there are eleven in the field.
It is nice to look out the window and see them all out there,
all different colors in the changing light and seasons.
They walk around the field a time or two a day

and come past the house.
Sometimes they take their naps outside the studio window.

.

by Lynn Thomas

written about 1996

Muddy Creek

Thursday March 6 2008

Clearing Storm

Half Moon Mountain. It sits east of Pinedale at the base of the Wind Rivers, which are hidden by the dark clouds.This is the view from Boulder.

Hope it didn't confuse you but I switched pictures for today with yesterday, so I could stick a photo of the snow plow on yesterday's blog with its story.

Another beautiful morning, but it was about minus 15 degrees last night. The siding was really snap, crackle, popping when the sun hit it this morning. The wind is supposed to blow up to 30 mph tonight, so we will see if that happens. Got up to about 30 degrees this afternoon, lots of sunshine.

Showered and am doing laundry today. Got Sparky and Raven all brushed. Raven needs her toenails cut, but as soon as I mention it she sneaks away and disappears. I'll have to just take her by surprise one of these days and get it done. She is having trouble standing up on the linoleum if she gets in a hurry.

Am feeling pretty good, and have not been needing any pain pills. I often keep forgetting to take them so I guess that's a good thing. Not sure what I'll do today yet, so might come back if anything interesting happens. Kind of blogged out at the moment after the last couple of days.

- Nope nothing interesting, in fact had the nicest nap this afternoon. Debbie called before dinner and we talked for a while. You might have heard about the colonoscopy clinic in Vegas that was reusing syringes in their procedures. They closed 5 clinics. Both of them had been there, and Curtis has to go get tested for HIV or hepatitis. Debbie's was prior to the time they are checking, so hope she is o.k. This is just awful.

Jackie who lives on a farm in eastern Washington said a loud noise woke her up the other morning, and she later found out a meteorite had broken the sound barrier going over their place and landed in a nearby town. She didn't know more at the time. I have never experienced that, the sound anyway. Just seen what we call "shooting stars", sometimes they seem close... or not. Must have been something exciting to be that nearby anyway.

Our friend Ruth who is also an artist sent an email note today from Guatamala. She went to a painting workshop down there, and took her mom with her. Guess they are having a good time and seeing lots of new things.

Sally sent me this and thought you might like to see it too. Thanks Sally. (Think "Roseanne".) This is a video of the Cactus Cuties, very talented young ladies ranging in age from 8 to 13. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKCVS57j284

Wednesday March 5 2008

Another Snow Plow - Thanks Mark !!

Although got up pretty early, mostly rested today. Sleeping pretty good. It was quiet. Started some of the symptoms of the chemo on the way home last night including a little shoulder pain, but it was mild. The thing that doesn't seem to get much better is how much my eyes hurt after each treatment, like very bad eye strain, for several days afterwards. That was quite miserable last night and all day today. Lots of eye drops and cool cloths over my eyes. The thing is that this is when I want quiet time to read or watch TV or just mess with the computer and its very uncomfortable. So there's my whining. Watched an interesting movie anyway, "The Boy With The Green Hair". In all these years, even though I'm a movie buff, I've never watched that one for some reason, but really enjoyed it today. Perhaps a person just isn't ready for certain movies but later, sometimes much later, can delight in the story and performances.

Before lunch time I heard an engine again and went to check it out. Another snow plow was in the yard!! This time it was Mark with a big green dump truck and a pretty big plow. He and Joe visited for a while then he cleared out the big icy bumps in front of the garage door and enlarged a couple of areas for parking or getting turned around, as well as clearing out the lane and the road in from the county road again. Everyone is just taking such good care of us, it's hard to believe. Maybe they heard about Joe's truck and know we shouldn't park my car out by the mailbox so nothing happens to it. Someone mentioned that us being stranded or really snowed in with no transportation could be life threatening. That's a little dramatic, but basically true. We still would have the snow machines. Maybe I could trek to Pinedale with the sled to shop.

Today was warmer, partly cloudy with plenty of sun. It snowed all night last night and quit this morning. We got about 2 new inches - Joe said 1/2 an inch. Each time the dogs went out they needed to be rubbed off with their towel. They love that. Sandra called this morning and she said they had 5 inches, and they are only about eight miles from here. We had our usual good visit and discussed politics, conservations easements, solar panels, the airport, their cabin at South Pass, border control, the one North America or one world theory (neither of us think it can work because as Sandra said somebody's uncle is going to be sitting out in the shed making a bomb), and other various subjects. Cousin Maryanne called this afternoon and it was so nice to talk to her. They all seem to be doing fine.

Joe and the dogs went out to the mailbox and brought in today's mail. In a little while I'll pay the bills on line that have come in. Joe thinks the truck rustlers took his big tow chain and kept it, so we need to report that to the insurance adjuster. In order to do yesterday's blog right this morning, I googled a lot of the medical definitions in the CT scan report, and read up on them. Printed out a 10 page article on what seemed to be the best information about the liver lesions to understand that better. I haven't spent much time doing any research so far. I haven't been able to focus on that kind of thing for long and retain it anyway, but that is getting better now.

Tuesday March 4 2008

Horses Near Boulder This Morning

He has lots of horses right now.

ANOTHER LONG ONE:

Charm called about 7:30 and said it had been snowing hard at her house and very overcast, but had begun to lift and she could see some blue sky to the west. We had no snow here, only overcast and blue sky to the south, so we decided to go ahead and make our trip. I left in time to stop and take a few pictures of the stormy sky and others of Roger's horses with their heads hanging over the fence waiting for the boss to come with the tractor and some hay.

We met at Boulder about 9. The roads and the trip to Jackson were just about like most of the others. Parts of the road dry and some were icy and snow packed. The wind started blowing hard around Cora and all the way to the Rim, then settled down. It made the visibility poor and driving slow. We followed a snowplow and the wind blew great clouds up from the blade but not back at us, rather up the hill off the right side of the road. Wish I had a photo of that. Again more fresh snow had fallen and was noticeably deeper, with the berms alongside the road higher yet. The fresh snow was still on the evergreens and even though dark and stormy as we went further north, the drive was beautiful. It was pretty gloomy in Jackson.

Because driving was slow, we were right on time for the 11 a.m. appointment, not early as sometimes. All the chairs were full today. Some of the patients were familiar and some I hadn't seen before, but I met an oriental lady next to me who Paige introduced as Princess. She said it was the translation of her birth name. Everything went more quickly today, with the blood tests coming right back as good and the chemo drip was soon begun.

Paige did her usual checkup for the records. And I asked the questions I could think of. First, whether they had increased the dose of my chemo cocktail and Paige look at me a little funny and asked why. I told her I had felt a setback of pain and taking more time to get over the treatment last week. She said they had increased it by 30 ml but seemed to think that was small enough that I shouldn't have felt anything. But I did. I just wonder why they didn't tell me that. Last week they increased the steroid they give me by 1/2 a pill to 2 and 1/2. When I asked why, she said it was so I would feel better after the treatment.

Mainly I wanted to ask Judy Bayse after the fact (because she was in the checkup with me) what Dr. Ward had meant last week by saying "They don't mention it" when I asked him twice whether the pancreatic tumor had shown on the CT scans. Right away they let me read the report of the scans and asked if I'd like a copy. I said Yes, could I please have one. I'll edit and shorten it and put it at the bottom of this post for those who had the questions about this, and about the larger lesions on the liver since the last scans. It does answer those questions pretty well. Just skip it if you don't want all the details. I also asked about eating milk and sugar, or anything else I should be doing or not doing. Paige said just do everything or anything in moderation, that they had no evidence that anything was harmful, but to have plenty of fiber and whole grains, fruit and vegetables. She also said a runny nose was typical.

So Charm and I visited while we were waiting. After getting finished we went over to the Sweetwater Deli for lunch. I had a chicken salad stuffed avocado and Charm had her usual soup and salad. There was delicious honey wheat bread too. We didn't need to stop anywhere, and decided not to go to galleries or shopping, but just to come on home so we weren't too late getting back. The wind was still blowing, more so after we got out of the canyon. There was a lot of drifted snow blown over the highway which can get very icy. The picture below shows what that looks like, and the snowplow had been here not too long before:

Blowing Snow on Highway

(we are on the wrong side of the road momentarily)

We stopped for gas in Pinedale. We stopped for a few minutes at the airport. There was a man there who Charm said was the helicopter pilot. I didn't know there was one there, but he drove his truck over to one of the hangers and Charm said the helicopter was parked in there. Then Charm got her car at Boulder. Later she called and said that she rode the snow machine up to Boulder Lake in a terrible windy whiteout, but didn't have any trouble getting home. My way was windy too, and let up about East Fork as it often does. Richie Road was good until I got to the fork that goes up to the feed ground and there was a drift there I had to plow through, then the rest of the way was fine with only small encroaching drifts on the windward side of the lane. Got home about 4:30, a little earlier than usual.

Joe asked how our road was and I said fine. But no wonder since he said Bill had been in with the county snow plow again and cleaned it out. I couldn't believe how good they are being to us by making sure the road is o.k. We had leftovers for dinner and I was ready to relax. For the first time this year we ate dinner without turning on the lights. I'm always so glad for the longer days. By sunset the sky was clearing and there was a lovely sunset to the west. But the sky to the east was the ugliest yellow gray I've ever seen, very ominous and unusual looking. When I let the dogs out about 10:30 it was snowing and looked like it had been for a while.

SHORTENED VERSION OF CT SCAN REPORT: My comments in italics.

There are extensive diffuse degenerative changes in the lower thoracic and lumbar spine (details of what and where) consistent with degenerative change. No findings to suggest lytic or blastic metastatic changes to the lumbar spine. Prominent spurring to both iliac (pelvic) wings, possible prior trauma (my guess probably from when they did bone grafting from my pelvis to my broken elbow, as well has my numerous horse wrecks and crash landings.) (from reading on the Internet this is relevant because this cancer would/could probably metastasize to this area but there is no evidence of that now.)

There is what appears to be scarring in my lower left lung - (not sure from when, perhaps when I had pneumonia 5 or 6 times 20 to 25 years or so ago because these same scars were there in the early October scans, so not from the lung collapse. Otherwise apparently o.k. there. )

The spleen is normal. The adrenals are unremarkable. The kidneys are stable. Hydrodense areas scattered throughout the right kidney consistent with small cortical cysts are stable. (Medical lingo here is about changes due to the surgery which sounds o.k., bile duct bypass looks o.k., also where they took out the gall bladder is o.k. I guess I have quite a few clips or staples in there. )

There are multiple lesions scattered throughout the liver varying in size from less than 1 cm to larger than 2.5 cm which were not present on October 13, (and there were small lesions on the liver then so these are new or bigger) consistent with extensive diffuse metastatic disease to the liver. There is a stable appearing cyst in the right lobe of the liver which measures 3.5 cm. Some degenerative changes related to the superior iliac wings (which was the lower level of the scans.).

(Here - the biggest question I and some of you had confusion about after the Dr. Ward appointment is answered:) The overall prominence and bulk of the mass in the head of the pancreas is no longer apparent, and the soft tissue mass related to the transverse descending duodenal junction is not apparent.

Monday March 3 2008

On The Way to Boulder

Joe went to town early this morning for his blood test. The dogs got to ride along. He asked if I wanted to go, but I'm ready to relax and be home today. I suppose he might stop at the repair shop to check on his truck. He's worried about it sitting outside and the weather blowing in through the broken out window. Our insurance agent called right at 9 a.m. and said that their adjuster would go to Troys tomorrow and assess the damage and take photos. Then he will call us within 24 hours. It will pay for the repair less our deductible.

Another beautiful sunny day and should get fairly warm again. I can hardly keep from just looking out the window at how beautiful it is. Maybe a good day for a walk this afternoon. Tomorrow is the next chemo appointment. Charm and I will meet at Boulder and go up to Jackson together. A storm is supposed to be coming in tonight but hopefully it will just be some snow showers on Tuesday. Wind isn't on the forecast.

As usual funny things are going on with the PC. I've given up on trying to use Office Outlook, the fancy new email program, and am not happy to have bought the software and not have it just work. I'm sure its just settings I don't know how to set ..... or unset as the case may be. So tried Outlook Express again. Remember that it wouldn't import the address book either, or didn't show the files. Well..... now it does. I have no idea why, but I've so gladly quit the awful Hughes.net email program, and am using Outlook Express. What a relief to be able just to click a name and send a message. Have not been able to do that since I got the new computer and gone through all the repairs etc. Of course all the messages saved in Hughes.net want to download into Outlook Express and I'll have to deal with them. But since I've been in my purging mode, have made decisions that I don't need ALL those emails to be saved. To know which few I do want to save will take skimming through all of them though. Still a tiny bit of my "Monk-ness" rearing its compulsive head.

Later this afternoon Jerry came over with his dump truck with a plow on it and cleared our road out again. It's perfect timing for going out tomorrow and also just to keep those drifts from piling up and closing in. Said he was coming over this way anyway. He came in and had a cup of coffee and visited with us. It was good to see him, he's a nice guy. Guess the Jensen and Richie cows will be coming over in a couple of weeks now to have their calves and feed out the hay that is here. Can spring be far off now?

We've talked about earth shadow before, check this one out!

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap080301.html