Sharing another visitor's photos, by Curt Ahlemeier in June 2025, which he shared on the internet. I visited the same sites in April this year. (Here and HERE.) But it's always fun to see someone else's' viewpoints.
More of Curt's photos soon!
Sharing with Wordless Wednesday on Tuesday.
---------------------
Today's quote:
Beautiful young people are accidents of nature, but beautiful old people are works of art.
~Eleanor Roosevelt
Somehow this beginning of the month is harder for me to write about.
I've been procrastinating, and now it's here.
Don't know why, because Autumn is always my favorite month...fresh crisp air and leaf colors...kids going back to school, a new year in a way.
I've never felt it was the dying time...but maybe it is. So perhaps I should be embracing the dying of things. After all it happens to all of us, and even more often to our various appliances. I'll think of the term for that soon. Planned obsolescence.
The cycle of life. That's a term which we can all relate to. Think of the song Circle of Life in The Lion King.
And a bit more artistic, I found this source of all of Van Gogh's works, on Open Culture.
Very timely when considering how many of us become somewhat (or more) depressed with wintertime greys and low light levels in the northern hemisphere. Seeing such beauty expressed on canvas by a man who clearly had a rather depressing life, gives a bit of joy to me.
OK rabbit rabbit. I'm all for increasing the amount of good luck in everyone's lives!
Baby bunnies raised by my son's family in CT several years ago.
And Happy Labor Day...celebrate as you choose.
Finally the end of August!
What a month it's been. Topsy turvy might be the best description. My dizzy spell one night echoed another blogger's, as well as my good friend Teresa (who just went back on taking Meclazine daily) and then hearing about my ex-hubby taking a spill onto his face ending up with 2 black-eyes (I didn't get to see the photo, just heard about it.) Otherwise in my health I lost a tooth and had to have the root pulled separately, got infected so went on antibiotics, then surprisingly got in to see a neurologist and got a new diagnosis. (The surprise was an appointment due to a cancelation.) I had a small accident of backing into my landlady's new car. I ate many meals with friends as well as continued to pick up low-cost lunches in little clam-shell containers. I hiked! Yes, a mile and a half to High Falls just before my 83rd birthday. Whew, that was so hard for me, but totally worth it. Birthday was celebrated low-key with several friends over several weeks sharing meals.
When talking with my sons, I learned some surprising things that are happening in their lives.
The weather was most cooperative in finally giving 70s during the day for the last couple of weeks and down into 50s on Monday night...and continuing.
No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted. |
AESOP |
For Saturday's Critters this week, I re-share some photos about my grand-cat Shiva.
Back to considering motorcycles for Sepia Saturday!
A couple of posts from my past blogging...
 |
| Not my ex-husband's first motorcycle, but similar! |
 | |
| Not me, nor the exact model we rode in the 70s, obviously! |
Travel has always been a central theme in photography. Ever since the days of the first Box Brownies, we have got our cameras out at weddings and when we go on holiday. Our theme image this week features a couple of motorcyclists from 90 years ago, with their motorbikes and set against a faded seaside scene. The lady is my mother, the gentleman was a family friend - and the chap with the camera would have been my father. They were travelling - in this case to the village of Blue Anchor in Somerset. You can go where you like for Sepia Saturday 790 - the destination is yours to choose. All you need to do is to post us a link to your old photographs on or around Saturday the 30th August 2025 HERE.
------------
Today's quote:
No one who has ever touched liberation could possibly want anything other than liberation for everyone. |
REV. ANGEL KYODO WILLIAMS |
So I have yet another diagnosis to add to the list on my patient portal. That's the bad news. My legs and feet have "neuropathy." They have lowered feeling from mid-calf down. I'm sure a few of my readers experience the same thing.
I've been having trouble walking up and even down stairs. And when standing from a sitting position, I felt like my legs were wood, and waited a minute to start lurching forward. Which was good for my blood pressure also! I didn't feel like I couldn't walk, just had my legs spread in my gait to make sure I was steady.
The good news is that some of my balance issues can be helped (a bit, I hope) with physical therapy. I will be evaluated this next week, and hopefully start working on being more capable, better balance, and gait. I've worked with this therapist before and liked him.
The neurology report on my memory difficulties was to be expected...somewhere in the mild range. I did have trouble giving answers on the verbal test at times. At least I was oriented to time and place. The doctor didn't seem to appreciate my jokes though. I respect him for that. But he said it was a normal range - however when the comments were typed up, he said mild memory impairment. I take that as validation of what I thought was happening.
And third, and perhaps most important, my essential tremor in my fingers is perhaps going to respond to higher doses of the medication I took before. However it has side effects for my breathing. And/or my breathing meds have side effects for my fingers. It's a delicate balance.
I've got to breathe. I don't gotta type blogs every day. But it would be nice to be able to type, feed and dress myself.
I decided to go ahead and talk about me here, because last night (writing on Tues) I took the Primidone (which is also for seizures) and slept through the night, not even getting up to use the bathroom. I think I felt drugged when I woke up, even though I also felt I'd slept well. It's interesting to note that it's a barbiturate, a central nervous system depressant.
Primidone is something I started at half this dose, and took for a couple of years, before getting to this level. I stopped it four months ago because the doctor in the hospital told me of how it affected the memory of his father. He didn't tell me I should stop it, just gave me that information. (I told the neurologist this, but he never commented on it.)
I personally didn't notice any help with memory having 4 months off that drug, while my fingers got more and more shaky. (I have to use my left hand to steady my right one enough to write anything legible.)
The Albuterol inhaler is called a rescue inhaler. Nobody ever said "this is when you need it." They just said, you'll know. So I found by trial and error that it did help if I was going to do anything like climb a flight of stairs or walk around the lake...by using it beforehand. It doesn't seem to do much if I'm coughing a lot, which can be caused by stress, inhaling chemicals or dust, or exhaustion.
I've also got the same drug in my nebulizer, which I use to clear out my lungs with a saline inhalation twice a day. Then I am supposed to use an Albuterol solution also. I've never noticed it made any difference.
And now the neurologist told me that Albuterol could diminish the effectiveness of the Primidone.
OK, I've done a bit of research on line, and the drug interaction between Primidone and Albuterol doesn't show up on my first attempt to see more research. However, a neurologist did tell me that, and wrote it in his clinical notes about me.
So now I'm trying to balance between my fingers tremor and breathing.
Did I mention the side effect of being lightheaded all day? So I didn't take the Primidone the next night.
All art today came from the internet!
My last post from last week's hike. Some disappointments, after all, that's the way things happen. And definitely a site that was worth all the efforts. And for me it was supreme effort!
The beginning of the hike.
Well, the rain did hold off until we had just packed in all the picnic things, checked for ticks that might be riding home with us, and piled into the car.
So the dampness of our 1-1/2 mile hike down to and up from the High Falls was due to the woods as well as our own sweat. The woods were very thick, with some oaks and beech and pines, very high up. And many Mountain Laurel and Rhododendron as underbrush.
Then on the forest floor were the ancient leavings of leaves and humus that was inches thick, upon which all kinds of moss and fungus could be found.
