This one's for my friend Flash

Why, yes, I completely forgot the photograph. I have too many blogs to keep up with.
I also have a friend who is in her nineties and she runs circles around me. Since she gave up
her car, I have been taking her more places. I think she could have continued to drive a bit
longer but I admire her ability to give up the keys.

We have Red Hat groups here. I have not joined one yet. But I aspire to eccentricity. Much
to my husbands embarrassment. There have to be some pluses about getting older. And not
caring what anyone else thinks is a great one. I think I have read that poem. I belonged to a poetry group but I think I outlived everyone in the group. I live in a town which attracts a lot
of retirees as the cost of living is low here. Property and taxes are low.

In this photo, we were taking a back road from Maryville, Tennessee to Pigeon Forge, recommended to us by our godparents grandson. The journey to Pigeon Forge was much
nicer than the actual Pigeon Forge. Pigeon Forge has become a tourist trap and the closer we
got to the town, the more traffic we encountered. It became so awful that eventually we decided
to skip Pigeon Forge. But we did enjoy the scenery on the way.
Today is quite grey looking. I am hoping for a huge rainshower.

Getting Old is Not for Sissy's

My mother's cousin says this all the time. She is 87 and already younger acting than I am. She
has painted the whole inside and outside of her house. I get tired just watching her. This morning I tilled some plant food into my new flower bed. I was then worn out. I must get in better shape.
I am trying to walk one hour per day. So far, I cannot even make it to 40 minutes.
My favorite television show will be coming on in thirty minutes. It was not very well written
last week. I hope the storyline is better tonight. If not, I have some great books to finish reading.

I am anxious for Fall weather. This summer has seemed to go on forever. This morning it
was almost cool. It lasted for about two hours. I opened the windows and the cats loved it. I love when a cats eyes widen very large. I wonder what they are thinking when that happens. I saw a snowshoe siamese at the humane society pet adoption. My husband just gave me "the look".
Maybe I will outlive him and I can become that sherry drinking, eccentric cat lady. You know
the one with 50 cats who has all the empties lined up outside the door. Sadly, I had to give
up my Harvey's Bristal Creme. It was putting too much weight on my hips. Which, I have not
yet lost.

Sometimes I think my husband does not appreciate all my great qualities. For instance, I like
to sing out loud in the grocery store and I talk to perfect strangers. In my opinion, a stranger
is just a friend I haven't been introduced to yet. Men are so proper. Glad I was born a woman.

Here is a photograph we took on a back road whilst on our way to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. It
was lovely. I would like to live in a little house in that field. Ta Ra. Goodnight Sweet
Princes of Maine.

I graduated!!!!!!!!

Yes, after two months in painful physical therapy I now have "daily range of motion" necessary
to do everyday ordinary things. I still cannot raise the bad shoulder/hand behind my back up
to my bra strap. But, I can accept that. The only way to have 100 percent range of motion
would be to let the orthopedist surgeon put me under and then rip open all the capsulation
and clean it out. Then I would technically have a new injury (my partially torn rotator cuff
already is past the scar healing point with calcium deposits( and then I would have my arm in
a sling for three weeks, and then three to six months of physical therapy. I will wait and see how
I feel. My internist says that if I keep up my therapy exercises at home, my shoulder will continue
to ache but I will keep what mobility I have gained. But, if I quit my exercises, my shoulder will
no longer hurt, but I will lose all mobility again. I think I can live with the pain. Hey, if it gets
to bad then I will consider surgery. All this has just given me a wake-up call. A reminder
to get in better health, to move more and quit eating "crap". ie. white sugar and flour.

Since my purchase of a quite expensive camera, I have now become obsessed with perfection
and now I delete what I used to consider lovely photographs. Sigh. I have learned that
in photography, light is everything. What time of day light, which direction the light is coming
from. It all makes or breaks a photograph.

Having had success with hollyhocks this summer after trying for 13 years. I am now starting
a bigger flower bed this Fall. And I hope this one is outstanding. I am making a very amended
soil bed before I even plant one seed. I have added foxglove, delphinium, and even Canterbury
Bells to the mix. Why not. I finally got Hollyhocks to grow. Anything is possible.
I updated here because I wanted to leave a comment on a Blog. Then I realized it had
been weeks and weeks since I updated. Ok, back to your regularly scheduled programming.

Progress is slow but steady

Today started my second month of physical therapy for a partial rotator cuff tear. I have almost
attained mobility in all rotations except external rotation. If I am lying down on a bed on my
back, I cannot lay my arm flat from elbow to wrist. It sticks up in the air. I can now touch the
middle of my waist but no my bra strap.

Brenda still delights in torturing me. It seems that way. Friday I had my ultra sound therapy
and the front desk lady was doing that. And when she was done she said, "Ok, you're through,
you can go." Now I knew that could not be true because Brenda had not done any soft tissue
manipulation. (a synonym for "brutal pain") But I almost flew out the front door. Well,
Brenda made up for it today. In spades. "I knose this hurts you so much. But yur doing
soooo goood. Just a little bit more. A little bit more. A little bit more. Youse doing soooo
goood. ARRRGGGHHHHH Big scream here. (I don't scream anymore, it tends to scare the
elderly people.) Oh, thats right, thats me. But I do moan loudly.

I am up late watching David Letterman. He is sick. He has a cold that won't go away. Thats
what happens when you have a late in life baby. Aging immune system's and four year olds
do not go together. Sorry Dave. The truth hurts. I have been taking endless photographs
of my two hummingbirds. I am sure making their life miserable. My husband is working
an all nighter. I must get to bed as I have a physical therapy session at 1oam tomorrow.
I hope this is the last month of this. I wanted to go to England in September.
Ok. Have a hummingbird. This is a juvenile male ruby red-throated hummingbird. He has
just one or two spots of red on his throat.

Things are looking up. And my arm is straighter

And I don't scream so much. I groan a lot. Especially when Brenda puts her knee under my
armpit and pulls my arm away from my body sideways. I try to keep talking non-stop to her
and chew gum at the same time. It keeps my screaming level down to..... oooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhh........ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh........... STOP... It is embarrassing to
be the only one being such a baby in physical therapy. But when you have an almost frozen
shoulder (a true frozen shoulder would mean you cannot even lift it yourself. It is literally useless and someone else has to move it for you.) and someone pulls it out and stretches it. Well, just imagine the pain of someone ripping your arm out of its socket. Then you get the picture. I have
already been through John, the therapist. He lasted only the first day. I could not help it. I had
no idea how bad the shoulder was until he started manipulating it. Or tried to. Because at that point this blood curdling scream came out of my mouth that I had no idea was going to happen.
Every head in the place turned, it got real quiet. And John, went to call my orthopedist. The next day I had Brenda. Now Brenda is very sneaky. She talks baby talk to you in Puerto Ricanesse. Youse doing soooo gud...... thats good, thats good. A little more, just a little more.
Com on, youse can do it...... She is so sweet that you just bite you tongue and let her kill you.
So, then after Brenda left huge bruises on my arms, they gave me Ricky who is actually in training to be the director of the place. He has his PHD and will be getting his license soon. He taught me more about the tendons, muscles and shoulder parts then I ever knew. How they work together. Why he is working certain joints. He likes to jiggle and shake things out. He works up to the big pull, so you are doing a slow motion groan.... Did you know that everytime
you work out on weights or work your muscles hard, you are actually tearing them and repairing them. Think of raw meat. Thats your shoulder muscles. And you tear them down in order to build them back up. That is why you are so sore from a workout the day before. Those little tears are healing up. Interesting. I will never take my shoulders for granted, again.
So, now I have Brenda. And I tried bribing her with Tostones and Templeque, two puerto rican foods she loves. I have now grown to love them too. Especially those coconut squares. But,
she just ate them up, and then proceeded to hurt me. But I am getting her scared of me. Yesterday she was trying to show me the position for an arm stretch on the table. And she did not quite have her arm as straight as it should be. So, I very nicely reached over and flattened her arm for her. And said, "Let me help you". (its exactly what she says and does to me when my shoulder or arm is not quite, there. She pushes it a bit more) Brenda looked at me "shocked" and said, "youse are scaring me". And I mean nothing derogatory by imitating her accent. She mostly puts on the accent heavy because we all love it. She tells us when she gets mad, she loses her accent. Lucky for me, I have not heard that yet!! So, I am almost there. I can do
everything in the stretch department expect touch my bra strap. I can even put hot rollers
on the back of my head again. Here are my tostones and templeque. They are very good.
Just fried green plantains and coconut dessert squares. Mojo sauce goes good with the Tostones or you can just use ketchup. They taste like crispy french fries. Oh, and I bought
way too many flower seeds for the Fall. Lost my mind.

Physical Therapy is not fun and games.

Had my second full day of physical therapy on my injured shoulder Friday. I did much better as I had the best therapist. Wednesday all I did was scream when he tried to stretch my shoulder.
Friday my new therapist told me I have an encapsulated cuff or shoulder. I think that means its almost frozen. I coudn't be fully frozen or I would have no movement or use of the arm at all.

I want to go to England so badly this year. All that is holding me back is the money. I even have
a place to stay in Kent, Broadstairs for a few days. It just costs so darn much to go to England and Europe now due to the money exchange being god awful.

I forgot to put up the hollyhock and flycatcher a few days ago. I just made myself a breakfast
bowl like Crystals does. Grits, sausage, scrambled eggs all mixed up in a bowl. Yummy.
My flycatcher still has babys in the tree stump. It seems like they have been feeding those
babies forever. Maybe they lost the first nesting and this is the second one. From my observations, Flycatchers are not the brightest bulbs in the bird kingdom. Seem sort of
flighty and goofy.

Must go do my therapy exercises. Ta Ra. As the english say.

A Month Behind

It is not my fault. I have had this sore shoulder for six months and just found out I have a partial torn rotator
cuff. Trust me. It is not fun. I cannot put my left hand in a sleeve, comb the back of my hair, sign checks for
accurately or raise my left arm above my waist. And MRI's are not fun either. I did not mind the noise or
the coffin like t.v. dinner tray which they slid me into the tunnel on. But, lying perfectly still for fifteen minutes
was just excruciating. I suddenly had to cough, scratch my nose, sneeze, twitch, itch........ But, I got through
it because I knew if I squeezed that little call button that we would have to start all over again at one minute.
I hope to never injure myself again enough to need an MRI. All I did was break my fall when I tripped by putting
out my left arm. It did not hurt that bad when it happened. But suddenly I started noticing my arm was not
working quite right. And sleeping in any position was painful.

So, what else is new. My owls have been gone for a month. I had a crested flycatcher with a nest in my old
tree stump. Those babies are gone now too. I never even saw the babies. Maybe the stray cat got them. He
has been looking really hungry lately. It is too hot to be a lime as Ephant says. Must be close to 100 F
today. My hollyhocks are still blooming but wilting a lot. I have saved some seeds from the magenta ones
for Kat (on my journal) I had pale pink, single flowers (those do not seem to be making seeds, grrr.) I had
double pinks, I had one cream color flower. No true reds or yellows. I plan to plant a lot more Hollyhocks
seeds this Fall. Ok, my typing hand is cramping. My meds might be wearing off. I never see anyone
read this blog. With my arm hurting I might not be posting here a lot. I start physical therapy on Monday.
My elderly friend is in the hospital and I feel sick about that. She has a respiratory infection. She is 94
years old so that is not a good thing. I hope they have ultra sound at my PT place. I hope it does not hurt
a lot. I did not feel very encouraged by my orthopedist. He just sighed when he was looking at my MRI"s
and kept saying, "what to do, what to do" Does not give you a comforting feeling. Then he said he prefers
to take a slow approach rather than an aggressive one. Ok............ Goodnight. Glad to see Wheatieboy
is back home. Here, have a hollyhock. and a flycatcher.