Before the game.
During the game.
Go #50!!!
After the game.
Long after the game.
It’s always a bit of a culture shock going from two lane roads in Idaho to the big city Interstate in Austin. The skyline grows bigger and brighter every year.
This morning we are getting ready to leave for the airport. Time to go home for the winter.
Goodbye, my Texans! See you in December…
Here is Banjo Man watching the Nebraska-Maryland game on his phone using his YouTube tv app.
We were in the Spokane airport food court Saturday afternoon before boarding our flight.
Go Big Red…wherever we are!
6:24 AM.
Still dark out. So different from those summer mornings when the sky lightens dramatically at 4:30 AM.
I am up very, very early. We have a long travel day ahead of us, but I am wide awake and need coffee. I was ready for my first sip at 4:45 AM.
Do I plan to sleep on the plane this afternoon? I sure do!
Our rental car is in the driveway. Our suitcases are 90% packed. The house is ready for next year’s fun. And we are ready for some family time in Texas.
But I will miss the mountains. The lake. The good friends who make life worth living. It was a good, healing summer.
And I even baked a pie.
We aren’t packing up the car for a road trip back to Rhode Island today. Which is epic. Instead of hauling heavy suitcases into and out of airports, we are traveling tomorrow with small carry-on luggage.
Several boxes of clothes we can’t live without are making their way to RI via USPS. Neither one of us can believe how much time packing up the car took every year. We are definitely enjoying a more relaxed departure this week. Austin, Texas, here we come!
Here’s how we celebrated our 55th wedding anniversary. Are we “hot and fresh” like the pizza box says? We’d like to think so!
Rocco’s has become our new favorite place to eat, right in Clark Fork.
On September 20, we went to the Hope Community Center’s annual fall fundraiser.
A good time was had by all. I couldn’t dance, due to still wearing “the boot”, but nothing stopped me from having brats and beans for dinner and enjoying the company of cheerful friends.
It’s hard to believe we will be back in RI a week from today. That was a fast summer, a fast five months, a fabulous break from doctor appointments and scans and tests. October and November have typically been intense (remember the tree falling on the house a few years ago?) and filled with nasty surprises, but this fall should be peaceful and a whole lot more fun.
The lake and the mountains have worked their magic. Banjo Man and I are feeling much better than when we staggered into this beautiful retreat in May.
Two weeks ago My French Friend Janou invited the Real Housewives of Hope and Montana to her home for lunch.
A French lunch. On a deck overlooking the lake.
Tres manifique!
I’ve never watched any of the Real Housewives shows, but I do know that our group is not at all like those catty drama queens I’ve seen on commercials.
Don’t we look like a lot of fun?
MFFJ created an amazing six-course French-inspired menu.
One of the highlights was the first course, a casserole of sliced tomatoes and herbs baked in cream. I wish I had taken a picture.
September is the Social Season around here. Grandchildren are back in school. Company has returned home. Gardens no longer require care. Fruit needs to be processed–there are plums and pears and apples galore–but we do that in our own time and at our own pace. Sometimes we are forced to share with the bears and the deer.
I have always loved September.
And our lunches together grow more and more special.
Merci beaucoup, MFFJ!!!
Here are some of my Dollar Store “reader” glasses. This whole “cataract surgery” process has been a bit more complicated than I expected.
I wore my huge boot and hobbled into the hospital for the first surgery. The boot confused the nursing staff as they wondered if a mistake had been made and I was to have foot surgery instead of eye surgery. Of course they asked how I broke my foot and my reply–“I was rehoming a duck”–was met with silence and raised eyebrows.
Afterwards Banjo Man helped me hobble across the parking lot to the car. Along with the boot and the pink cane, I now sported a large plastic eye guard held in place by a ton of tape.
So pretty.
“Take me to Serv-A-Burger”, I insisted. “I am STARVING.”
In my defense, I hadn’t had anything to eat in nineteen hours.
Banjo Man: “Drive up window?”
I should have caught on then, because my husband never voluntarily goes into a drive-up window situation.
“Oh, no,” I said. “I can’t see well enough to eat in the car on the way home. I need to sit down.”
“I’ll drop you off,” he said. “I need to get a few things at Super 1. Like broccoli. And bread.”
It wasn’t until he sped off and I walked into this beloved local hamburger joint that I suddenly realized I didn’t look my best. The poor young woman at the counter did an obvious double-take and tried to hide her shock as she saw a plastic boot, pink cane, plastic eye guard, and a white haired senior citizen.
I must have been a vision.
Ask me if I cared. I wanted onion rings and I didn’t care what I looked like.
A few days later I learned that Banjo Man went to Super 1, bought no groceries, and leisurely enjoyed one of their famous 25-cent ice cream cones for half an hour while I gulped down a burger and onion rings.
There was no way he wanted to be seen with me.
I couldn’t blame him. No one in their right mind would have wanted to accompany me anywhere.
After the second surgery–yes, I still wore the boot but didn’t need the cane that day–we once again stopped at Serv-A-Burger again. This time Banjo Man went inside and ordered take-out.
I couldn’t stop laughing.
So now, almost two weeks later, I’m still trying to navigate life without long-distance glasses and life with needing “readers” for just about everything. I have bought five pairs and they are all over the house. I’ve been reassured that it takes about six weeks for vision to settle, so I am trying to be patient.
On the other hand, I can sit on the dock and see this:
Yep. This is my new ride. A visit with an orthopedic physician early this morning (I do think 8:00 AM is early) resulted in owning a new foot appliance.
The doctor actually sneered at my little “post op shoe”, declaring it wouldn’t do any good. A tendon in my leg had broken a bone in my foot as it rushed to protect my ankle. The tendon needed to be stabilized all the way up to my knee.
Thank you, leg tendon. I’m relieved my ankle is operating just fine.
This fancy schmancy boot will be with me for the next four weeks. The doctor said wearing it would stop the pain.
I beg to differ.
My tendon is screaming its objection to being encased in this plastic and velcro contraption. I hope we both will get used to it.
Okay. End of medical report. Here’s a sunset from last week.
Not exactly life in the fast lane, thank goodness.
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This shoe feels so good. I’d never heard of a “post-op shoe” before, but as of yesterday I own one. Remember how I twisted my foot while helping Banjo Man and the Duck Lady capture Dorothy in her pen?
It was raining. The rocks were slippery. Not the best combination. My walking stick saved me from falling.
Two weeks and two Ace bandages later I drove to town to Urgent Care. I’d finally–FINALLY!!!–decided I needed x-rays. Here’s the chart on the waiting room wall.
Hmm…
Did a duck rescue injury count fall into the “Animal Bites & Injuries” category? Or “Hullabaloo & Shenanigans”?
Dorothy sure caused a number of shenanigans.
The lovely nurse practitioner read the x-rays and said she didn’t see any fractures, but it was unusual for a sprain to last this long. Several hours later she called me and said the radiologist had seen a fracture. I needed to see the local orthopedic/sports doctor asap.
And I needed to return to Urgent Care Sunday morning to get a special shoe. Which I did.
I love this shoe. It’s made me much more cheerful and comfortable.
And that’s a very good thing.
After rehoming Dorothy, this happened:
I never dreamed that a twisted foot, a minor sprain, would be such an annoying thing to deal with this past week.
I will spare you the details, but I have needed to stay off my foot as much as possible, wrap it in ice packs and take Tylenol. But I still needed something to do. I like projects!
This is a very small sampling of scraps I have collected over the years. After each quilt creation I cut the remaining ends of fabric into strips and toss them into a bin. Fabric is too expensive to waste and scraps can come in handy. My daughter mailed several boxes (yes, boxes!) of these strips to the lake last year.
Having these strips meant I didn’t have to stand at a table to cut fabric. Lowering the ironing board meant I didn’t have to stand to iron seams and blocks.
In other words, I could put my foot up on a chair and still DO SOMETHING.
Yes, I have plenty of books on my Kindle reader, but lately reading makes me sleepy. And I can’t sit around napping all day long. No, no, no!
I can practice my guitar chords, which I do, until my fingers give out. I can search Pinterest for blueberry cake recipes. And write emails.
But…sewing random strips diagonally across newsprint squares certainly makes me feel better than anything else.
I spent part of an afternoon sitting on the floor separating strips into colors, so future stars could be blue or green or yellow…
Stay tuned.
Fourth of July
Glen the Banjo Man
LIVE at the Dump
is there any more pie? 