Total Knee Replacement 3 1/2 week update

Well, I am discouraged. I am walking pretty well but my range of motion is not good. I can bend my knee to about 90 degrees, but I should be at about 105 degrees. To bend is just so painful and I am so tired of taking pain pills. The therapist said to really concentrate on bending this weekend, take the pain pills and just keep working on it....well, I took 2 pain pills and then I was sick to my stomach all day! I don't know what happened.

So, I am going to try again today to push through the pain and get this leg bent! This knee replacement was way more than I thought. For some ignorant reason, I thought this was going to be a piece of cake. WRONG! I know that eventually everything will be OK....but right now I am down in the dumps and discouraged. If anyone has any words of encouragement, please leave a comment!

Total Knee Replacement Week 2

On November 19, 2008, I had a Total Knee Replacement on my right knee. I was out of the hospital in 4 days and I was told that I was doing very well!

This is deffinately the most painful thing that I have ever had. The therapists still say I am ahead of schedule but the pain is unreal during the exercises. Here is a picture of the knee on day 12.

If anyone reads this and has words of encouragement, please respond.


-- Post From My iPhone

USA Energy - COAL!!!

Where I live I overlook a railroad track. Each day I watch 10-15 trains go by filled with coal. This coal is traveling from my childhood state of West Virginia to Norfolk to be shipped overseas. Does this make sense? I suppose for trade with other countries, but not to solve our energy situation....

If our country does not start using our most abundant natural resource to free ourselves from oil dependence, well, shame on us. I am going to start sending letters to our newly elected officials to encourage and push for the development of "clean coal" power.

What are your thoughts on Coal?

I am proud to be an American

Today when I woke up I felt a relief. Like a huge rock had been lifted. I am proud that our country has moved in a new direction...change is a good thing..no matter how we voted we need to embrace our new president, just as we did when George W took office.

So, if anyone reads this please respond and let me know how YOU feel today!


-- Post From My iPhone

Our World Condition

When I think about the state of our economy, and really think....it is very scary! I am not scared by the fact that the bailout bill did not pass, I am scared that our whole economy is built on paper and it all means NOTHING! We developed this system and now we have to live with it. When I look around, in my very small field of vision, I see that everything is out whack! Have you ever watched someone work? Just pay attention to a co-worker and really watch what they are doing, you will be shocked! People do very little all day! They get paid BIG money to yap with co-workers, react, react, react, go to the bathroom, make coffee, run errands, and who knows what they do online!

Who is going to run our country in 20 years? I think it is a crime that our next generation is so out of touch! The "fortunate" kids are the worst; they think that $100,000 jobs are easy to get and they think that is a lot of money! Well, after taxes, car payments (another thing that makes me mad), mortgage/rent, utilities, food and now add in "play" money and there is nothing left!
Let's talk about cars; you will never find me buying a $50,000 car...and that is a cheap one! My parents brand new 5 bedroom house cost $47,000 in 1967!

OK, it is 9:45am and I am so irritated I can hardly stand it!

Again, I am going to start posting on a regular basis!

Ok, I have been gone for 9 months, go ahead and punish me! Well, I am back...I am working on setting up a websitem, but until then I am going to continue to post here....

We just got back from Emerald Isle (a week long vacation)! We had the best time...a friend's 50th birthday celebration! We had so much fun! Stand by for more!

The Bazzar Bazzar in Richmond

Carol, Mary and I went to this crafty event yesterday at the Richmond International Raceway. For years I have heard that this was so wonderful and that the stuff was really cool....well, hit me in the head, but this was just like, identical to any other craft show. What was supposed to make this such a wonderful show and what was to make it stand out from all of the rest?

I had a good time, mostly because we were out of the house, around people that were enjoying one anothers company and I didn't have to do any type of work....but midway through we had to leave; how many hours can you spend looking a crafts that do not interest you. Do these people really make money? The only booth that was selling up a storm was the "Cherry" Farm people.....everything made from Cherries!

Well, we attended, but I don't get it!

PS...Carol did buy a blouse and Mary had some bags....

Italy and Greece Vacation is approaching

May 24th we will be leaving for vacation. Carol and I are really excited, we are finishing up the of our trip and we hope to publish updates while away. I do hope that you will read the Posts....I will have an itinerary posted within a day or so....and update on packing etc. Stand by for more...

A Rejuvinated Blog

Hi all...I know I have been slacking posting my blogs, but I am back and I am going to start moving forward with postings to get everyone back on board. We have a vacation coming up and I will be posting from the vacation as a "Vacation Journal".

We are going to Italy and Greece the end of May.

Another upcoming event...spring fishing season! This spring I will be going to new places in Virginia and West Virginia. Stay tuned for more!

Hello from Lake Pearl

We are visiting my cousin David, Janet and their son Jackson....this is a picture from their deck. Today we are going to Providence RI to the Biltmore....More to come

Greetings from MA

We are on a special break in Boston visiting my cousin David. Please stay tuned...more to come this weekend!

My First Geocache

Now I am going to tell you all about this, but I can't tell you were it is! Ha! There are hundreds of "caches" in Richmond alone....and there are thousands and thousands worldwide. Anyway, I searched the website, www.geocaching.com and there were several within a short distance of our house.

Each listing has the coordinates and a dialog about the cache, sometimes the there are a lot of hints and sometimes there aren't. The main idea is to put the lat/long in your GPS and then find the hidden treasure. My first was a "micro" meaning that it is not a traditional cache (a box of items that you take something and then leave something) instead it is very small and usually only has a sign-in log. So, I set off knowing it was something really small....I searched for about 20 min. and found the clue, but stood there without any idea what I was looking for. Now one of the things you have to be aware of are "muggles", the public watching you and the fear is they will get the cache or destroy it....so you do not want the public to figure out what you are doing.

So, I didn't find it...I returned home very deflated....I talked about it and then Carol gave me a suggestion, so I set out the next day and found it! It was a little wooden plug that was in a knot in a tree that had been hollowed out with a little metal capsule inside. It was very, very clever in it's design. I looked at this the first time and thought it was a branch that had been pruned!

So, if you want to get out in the fresh air and go treasure hunting this is a really fun thing to do!

Geocaching....Another Fun Thing!

You know how I love a gadget, well, while searching around my new GPS I came across an icon that I did not recognize....Geocaching. I went to the Garmin website and read about it...and man, this is right up my alley....Treasure hunting via the the internet and GPS! Can you believe it?

What you do is go to www.geocaching.com and register (for free) then you put in your zip code (or the zip code where you will be traveling) and a list of "cache" sites will come up near the zip code you entered. you will get the lat/long and some clues and off you go to find the "cache" (treasure)....once you find it you then sign a logbook, take something and leave something....I found out there are several with 1/2 mile to my house!

Since I just found all of this last night at 9pm, I do not have all of the details but if you know me...you know I will have ALL of the details within a very short period of time. You know this might even enable me to get a little bit more exercise! (stay tuned, I am going to find my first cache as soon as it stops raining!).....

PS. I will be posting more entries...thanks for hanging in there for the summer!

The First 24 Hours

For our trip to the Canadian Rockies we decided to rent a 30' RV, a true home on wheels! Tammy arrived 2 days early to provision and clean the RV in advance of our arrival on 7/1/06 (Kim, Carol and I). On 7/1/06 all was well until we discovered we (Carol and I) missed out flight to Calgary because of delays in Atlanta. This meant that Kim and Tammy would need to replay "The Terminal" and hang in the airport from 1pm until 9:30pm! When Carol and I finally arrived we went to our rented home in the "oversized" parking lot, what a site!

Because we had to bring everything, Carol and I had 6 pieces of luggage and backpacks! We got all of the luggage in the RV and hit the road. Within an hour we started to see the gigantic mountain range in the distance. I had no idea how big those mountains would be until we saw them. It was really cool to be driving at 10:15 at night and still somewhat light out. The average sunset was about 10:20pm! Our first night we had reservations at the Banff Tunnel Mountain Campground. We arrived hooked up, which consists of plugging in the electric cord, and connecting a water hose. Carol and I unpacked for about a half and hour and we were all set for a cocktail!

The next morning we had to be up early 6am. we had to be in Canmore just south of Banff to go our first activity....we went on a helicopter ride over the Mountains and one of the southern glaciers. It was a stunningly beautiful morning about 70 degrees and bright sunshine. We flew over the area that Brokeback Mountain was filmed and discovered that 90% of the movie was filmed within 100 feet of the road! We were done with this activity by 9am and then hit the road North on our way to Jasper National Park. We stopped for a few things in Banff and then continued on 1A North in hopes of seeing wild animials. Our first animail was a giant Elk with a full rack!