E.R. Eye Opener

Wally's supra-pubic catheter had clogged last night. He was breathing fast and was in a cold sweat that soaked the bed sheets, it was about three in the morning and when I checked him, noticed the urinary bag had blood in it with little else. It should be about half way full or more with urine at that time in the morning. I did the procedure they showed me to do at the urologist office but the catheter still wouldn't drain. We needed to take him to emergency since Urgent Care wasn't open.
 
Getting in was a snap, there were only a few people and this was a Saturday night during a full moon. A special full moon at that since it is called a Super Moon being it is the closest it will get to earth for a while. That was good fortune, if you can call going to the E.R. fortunate.

The nurse we had was Asian with a thick accent. It's okay by me but she had difficulty with English. Like the word soiled. She wanted a rectal temperature of Wally and his weight. Okay but Wally has dementia and there was no scale for people in wheelchairs. I said, "Wally has soiled himself as they began to put him on a gurney.
"What?" she asked.
"When we were getting him in the car, Wally soiled himself, you need to clean him if you're taking a rectal."
"What do you mean soiled himself."
"You know, he's messed his Depends."
"What?"
"He took a shit in his pants. You know, shit? He's crapped in his underwear."
"Please sit down, we will take care of this. What is your relationship to the patient?"
"We're married."
"Your his brother?"
"No, we are married to each other."

Now she has discovered Wally's poop and of course it is dropping out because she had his nappy pulled down and some of his shit is now on the floor. "We need towels," she announces.

"We have to clean him before we can take his temperature."

"No kidding," I'm saying under my breath. 

"Get the gurney with the scale," she says.

Wally is stood up again and they have to clean the old gurney and the floor, meanwhile Wally is in pain and having difficulty standing. One of the assistance tells him to stand up, another Asian.
I say, "Wally has dementia, he's doing the best he can."
"Stand. Mr. Wallace, do you understand me? Stand up."
"Wally has dementia and is doing the best he can. He's in pain."
 "We'll handle this. What's your relationship to the patient?"
"We're married."
"Your his son?"
I gave up. "Look you have to hold him, he can't do it by himself. He has dementia."
The idiot turns to the Asian nurse and says, "He won't respond."
I go over and hold up Wally while Stan, our caregiver cleans him and the medical staff watch. It's easier that way and fortunately they stayed out of the way until we're done with their job.

Put him on the gurney. That takes a while because they don't know how to put up the sides and once they're up find out it can't weigh Wally because the batteries for that are dead.

Here we are in an E.R. dealing with people with poor English skills and equipment not maintained. Finally they ask me his weight, which I told them at the beginning.
"You are a good son," the Asian nurse told me.
So much for the hard fought battle for equality in marriage. We aren't husband and husband, we are son and father.

The E.R. doctor was from India. He was good too, competent and very versed at English. Wally came home after a catheter was inserted in his penis. He has antibiotics to take and we need to make an appointment on Monday to have the supra-pubic catheter replaced and have him checked. 

It's a bit frightening though when you think what could happen if you're having a heart attack or can't respond and your spouse is a sister,  mother, son or father and the staff wants to weigh you first.

We Will Rock You At the Ahmanson

For old rockers, as ourselves, this was a walk down memory lane. The playful choice of words that came from old songs and lyrics to fill in the dialog of the characters was well done. The story line, to correlate along with the music, was your simple boy meets girl which, I thought, since Freddie Murphy was tres-gay--not right. Why didn't they have, boy meets boy? Or boy meets trucker since he liked truckers so much. When I looked up some info on Freddy,  I found we were born two months apart in the same year. Of course a lot of people were born that same year, the start of the baby boom generation. 

We went by way of the underground, The Metro red-line boarded at the North Hollywood station. After taking the elevator to the lower level, we came to a strange scene of television monitors and flashing strobe lights saying to evacuate immediately, yet no one seemed concerned. Maybe it was a teaser for the performance later that afternoon, and we disembarked at the Civic Center where the signs of a rainstorm in the form of puddles everywhere made a nice cleansing of the whole area. Little did we know that later in the day another rain storm at Venice beach would bring lightening that killed one person and injured others. Such strange weather we have.

After the performance we took the red-line to Hollywood and found a dive on Hollywood Blvd. Huge margaritas, big enough to call a bird bath but not really that good. But after diving into one, the food came, which made the food that was so-so, okay.

It was a good day and though I feared a hang over the next day, it never came, making it a real good day.  

Young Girls Coming To Our Organic Garden In The Middle Of The City

From Rhode Island yet, sweet young things with plump breasts and very, very fertile. I only hope the older girls won't pick on them too much because of their youth and inexperience, after all they're here to lay eggs and not be just another pretty face.

We lost two hens, I think to poison. A squirrel, at the time of two hens sudden death, was acting funny as well. Lethargic squirrels aren't usual and he didn't want to leave the pond near the hens where water was available, a sign of a toxic blood poisoning used on rats. I think it was the asshole that lives across the alley that did it but I'm not sure since the hen house is located next to the alley anybody could have done the evil deed.

That's the price you pay when living in a city of many different types. You have your share of assholes that's for sure. But you have good people too, somewhere I think, although they seem to be in hiding at the moment. The young hens arrived, and they are real young, I think about five weeks old from the way their feathers have developed. Too young to be with the older hens as yet. I'm a bit miffed about it. Led to to believe they will be fine with the older hens, when right off, I could see my money going into dead chicks from being pecked to death if I left them in the coop with the other girls. They are in a wash tub at the moment with a piece of chicken wire over the top to keep Millie from finding them.

It's going to take a couple of more weeks before they're big enough to fend for themselves. Lucky we have the warm weather for them and I'll have the time to watch them. It's won't be until they are about seventeen weeks old that they will be able to lay eggs though. That means a few more months.

One thing for sure, I feel more like a farmer than I did when I bought pullets matured enough that they laid eggs right out of the box. In fact, my first hens had two eggs in their shipping box when I got them. Live and learn, or is it, adapt or die. I forget, but either one is a good lesson on life.   

Delicious Cactus fruit In Our Organic Garden In The Middle Of The City

We have a Peruvian cactus( the tallest of all cactus) next to the garage entry. It came as a potted plant years ago that flowered that year in its pot. Hardy and tolerant of many conditions(I think that because the above ground root ball, exposed, makes it tolerable to our watered clay soil). It quickly grew in its oak barrel and from there, rooted into the soil. The plant is easy to propagate, cut anywhere on its stock, plant the down side, and then wait. The wait isn't long before you get flowers and possibly fruit.

In the summer it flowers as in the photo, only at night, closing by mid morning, they will open and close for a few days before turning black and falling from the cactus.  Beautiful, even more so a day ago because of a fortunate alignment that occurred at the same time. The full moon was at its closest orbit to earth, clear skies with the cactus in full bloom. Incredible to see towering overhead that night in the garden with cream white blooms a foot long and almost as wide catching moonbeams on clear summer night. 

  I wished I could take photos like the pros. My night shot really didn't show how wonderful the blooms looked like. They glowed in a gold-tinged white. The color of butter dripping from pancakes. But this shot was on the morning after, with bees busy deep in the stamens. The pollination that occurs brings a football shaped bright red fruit. The birds love them and get most of the fruit. I get what I can reach and allow pods to ripen a nice red when I see them begin to turn from green to pink.

The rind is cut off easily, once one side is slit leaving a  flawless white flesh specked with black seeds similar to banana seeds. They are slightly sweet with a refreshing crisp when eaten. The way the birds go after them, they have to be good.

Nice addition to a breakfast meal, once the fruit appears, I'll show photos of the flesh inside.

Germany won the world cut. I have polka music going in the patio in celebration of their title. It was a good game.

Growing Marijuana In Our Organic Garden In The Middle Of The City

 
Our crop of Mary Jane grows organically using our homemade compost and natural sunlight. Shit weed to some of my dope smoking friends because I'm not interested in high potency. This line of weed in the photo has been grown since the seventies by me. Each year I use seeds from the previous year to start a small patch of marijuana. For myself, I don't use much. What I do is make brownies using the homegrown. I take a brownie now and then when I have time to enjoy it. Every year I have left over weed.

Now, our caregiver, Stan smokes grass from the time he gets up until he goes to bed. The moment he wakes, he puts his pipe to his mouth and inhales high quality marijuana that he buys legally at one of the shops nearby. I don't have to worry about him smoking mine because he can smoke and smoke mine and still not get the high he needs from my homegrown. That's why constant smokers of grass call mine, shit-weed.

Stan takes very good care of Wally. He is gentle and observant to his needs, but he is stoned all day long and Wally only needs some basic care of fluids, walking, and using the bathroom, which Stan is very capable of, but for anything technical I doubt Stan could do the job. We gave him a computer for his birthday, a laptop. He loves it and has been trying to use it but he can't remember things, like passwords. A simple password has him baffled so that he needs to reenter new passwords over and over. And I'm talking about the simple passwords you make up. Stan isn't stupid either, but the constant grass smoking makes it appear he is. You have to tell him a number of times or explain things over and over to him. His girlfriend is the same.

The girlfriend, Maggie is looking for work. Good luck with that. She cleans the floor in Stan's room well but that's about it. I can't see her landing a job at anything that requires some sort of physical effort, she sleeps in until ten or eleven and eats while in bed. She is Stan's girlfriend, so if he can put up with it--fine. I don't care but she has no desires whatever other than to get stoned, watch cartoons, fuck and eat. Which works for Stan.

That's what I mean about being stoned all the time. There is no ambition in anyone I see that is. They are happy doing shit jobs for shit pay as long as they can stay stoned. And now that it is legal, they plan, (and by they, I mean everyone I know that gets high on a daily basis from morning to night) to stay that way.

Kind of sad really but hey, it's their life. I too like the feel of being stoned but for me it's for recreation. When there is a moment of opportunity to relax, listen to a concert and not worry about driving or what ifs that can come along. Life is good, live it to the fullest but live it, not stone it.

Soccer On The Fourth Of July, What's More American Than That In Our Organic Garden In The Middle Of The City

We have put on a fourth of July Party since before we were married. We were also married on the forth. A kind of stick in you eye to the Right Wing nut jobs. You know, call one up and say thanks for celebrating our same sex marriage today with fireworks and a party.

A flame of color shot upward over thirty feet from a cracker Stan set off. It was pretty cool. We had a great salad from our garden made from fresh tender crookneck squash with the flower bud still attached. Pasta with Gorgonzola cheese, fresh basil and cream. Watermelon sweet and cold and New York steaks, thick and barbecued to perfection. Yep a pretty good American Forth of July. Our anniversary, we've been together now for twenty years. That's pretty special for me on a very special day. 

Our Organic Garden In The MIddle Of The City

Well, I learned something about when to spray for fungus on grapes. It's one of the things I love about gardening--a laboratory to play in. There isn't a year that goes by where I don't learn at least a thing or two.

I know to spray the copper/ sulfur solution early but I didn't do it often enough. I should have sprayed while fruit was continuing to form for it's the grape clusters that are the most effected this year.

Not all the grapes were effected by the fungus but some clusters had a sever amount of fungus, and I noticed that they were from later formed clusters. We had a very dry period when the grape clusters first appeared, it wasn't until later that our damp mornings of June Gloom appeared, May Grey never happened. The photo above shows a cloudy, somewhat weak red grape cluster, some of the grapes are withered, as if left on the vine until November.

I spayed them now in hope that the fungus won't infect other, healthy clusters. The Thompsons and Concords didn't have the problem and are right on target.

These are developing very well, a bit sour right now but that's to be expected. The reds are beginning to sweeten up and already have a much sweeter taste than the Concord and Thompson.

We are nearing the time of more dry heat unless the forming El Nino changes things. Well see what develops in our laboratory in the backyard.