At Random

Random, sort of mundane thoughts from August:

My oldest son and his wife, the mother of Larry Bob, our grandson, have been married for six years now. They come from a long line of long marriages -- my parents over 50 years, Marty's parents over 50 years, Marty and I over 30 years, Sarah's parents over 30 years -- in this area we are all blessed and apparently very stubborn. A complete unwillingness to fail in a relationship is mandatory for a long marriage.

Marty is doing okay. We have now gone over three weeks with clean snot, what a joy, really, clean sputum is a big deal for us. We went to check in with the Great and Wise this week and he was pleased. We have been trying to take Marty off steroids so she can get ready for the winter Olympics and we are gradually reducing that dose. Steroids are good things but they do depress the immunity system and they do keep you from participating in the down hill events. We are doing everything we can to keep Marty's snot clean by checking her meds, reducing exposure to sick folks and practicing super hygiene. We may start a movement -- Clean Snot for Marty -- everyone please cough in unison.

We are still waiting to get some blood test results to check for any other unknown infection. It's always very difficult to know if there are underlying illnesses with Marty. Two weeks ago she had a slightly elevated white count (indicates infection) but that could have been due to exacerbated asthma. Who knows, that's what great and wise surmised though. We should know tomorrow if we need to start Marty on more antibiotics. I hope not.

If all goes well we are planning on having my family down to the lake house to celebrate my Father's 81st birthday. He is the youngest 81 I know. He and I are going to get up early Saturday and go fishing for hybrids with a guide. If we can get Lyle (my daughter Erin's significant other) to roll out of bed he's going to go. My kids took me over Father's day and we had an absolute blast.

Last, Marty went on Medicare about a year ago. I have to tell you, we did this because we had no choice and we did it with a certain amount of skepticism and trepidation. Because Marty was initially signing up we were able to also secure a MediGap policy, which is a smaller policy to cover what Medicare doesn't. Summary, it's been great to this point. Medicare has been better in every way than our private insurance. I can report though that the prescription donut hole is real and it really catches you by surprise. I don't know how most afford it. Anyway, I'm sure not everyone has this experience. I still dread getting the explanation of benefits from Medicare and I worry that some issue will occur. To date, it hasn't, so kudos to government run health for the first year.