July 30th = Memories

The end of July brings back the same old memories: hospitals, doctors, EMTs, waiting, worrying, praying...funeral directors.  Wow, it's been five years.

I try not to think about it. I have so many good memories that I can fall back on. This picture is of Joie and me at the Carlson Winery near Grand Junction, Colorado.We spent a week there looking at property and trying to decide if we really wanted to move there. Turns out that we didn't, but we had a good time.

One of my favorite pictures of Joanne. She is sitting in a meadow high up in the Big Horn Mountains...late July, 1975.Wildflowers (mountain lupines) were blooming all through the meadow. We were on a backpacking trip...much to the amazement of her friends and family. That trip pretty much sealed our fate. Anyone who would follow me through the wilderness wasn't going to give up easy and we were together for the next thirty-two years.



This year I'm a little distracted by my aching knee. Somehow I'm managed to get arthritis in my left knee that demands attention. I found Joie's cane and I'm hobbling around with a lot of pain. The doctor told me to wear a knee brace and take a anti inflamatory prescription. That was ten days ago and it is worse now. I go back to the doctor in a couple days. The xrays show 'bone spurs' and the space where my ligaments and cartlage should be has narrowed...hence the excruciating pain.


The Summer Olympic games are going on in London. I was looking forward to it but the news/sports coverage is so bad that I've pretty much given up on it. I watch some of the novelty sports. I watched field hockey...played indoors...and that was interesting. Rowing was interesting. Basketball is mostly NBA players. If I wanted to watch NBA I'd watch NBA. They should do the same thing with basketball as they do with soccer -- limit the teams to certain age groups. I'm tired of gymnastics and swimming.  Track and field will start in a few days.


If I seem a little grumpy I have good reason.