Wondering what to do (Figured it out! Maybe! Kinda!)

I've been trying to figure out how to add a Corpsman Chronicles page here in order to have all my personal sea stories in a single location. A few of you kind readers have thrown that request out there and I've both heard it and think it's a good idea.

The problem I'm running into right now is that I don't know quite how to pull it off. I do have a couple of fiction pages added to the blog but either I can't remember how I pulled that off or something has changed with blooger during the transition to the new, regressive interface.

One thing I think I could do is rename and reformat one of the fiction pages, then add (I think) hyperlinks to CC posts on the renamed/reformatted page. I can't help but wonder what will happen once blooger's legacy interface disappears for good. Will "pages" still exist? They should, but I should also be taller for my weight.

And at the complete tangent of taller for my weight, this morning I stepped on the scale and found that I mass 89.35 kilograms or 197 Ye Olde English pounds. Well over a third of my mass has departed since roughly the date of my last achilles surgery, whenever the hell that was. For those keeping score at home it was December 9, 2016. I still massed circa 275 pounds as recently as late March.



Back on topic, an alternative would be to publish a new Corpsman Chronicles blog. That feels like a best solution at the moment, and I could hyperlink new CC content from the present Naval Air Cowman/PrairieAdventure blog.

Either way, what I really should do first is sort through all my posts and reformat the CC-esque posts with a proper and consistent numbering scheme. I suspect I should number them chronologically by date of publication. I know there are a lot of essentially CC posts predating the first one which carried the Corpsman Chronicles moniker. And typically for me, the very first Corpsman Chronicle appears to be Roman Numeral Two, or II. As I sit here pondering that seeming fact I can't help but think it should be ultimately worked into a clever epitaph when I've departed this plane. "He Started By Dropping A Deuce," perhaps.

As I sit here banging on the bongos like a chimpanzee while my mind spins gaily through random colorful scents I'm wondering if simply doing a sequential copy and paste into a single document might be the way to go so far as getting all these stupid posts in proper publication order. Maybe I'll try that.



It'll take some time and effort but perhaps it'll be worth it, and perhaps even turn into something approaching a publishable book. Who knows? The possibilities are quite numerous and varied. I'm also getting to the point in my life where I could and probably should transition to something approaching a full time writing gig. I don't want to sit at a desk for the rest of my life by any means, but a productive and potentially profitable scheme might be in order.



As I read back over this post later in the evening I can tell you one thing for certain about the Corpsman Chronicles series -- it ain't as voluminous as I thought! Seems like I couldn't figure out the Roman Numeral thing. SMH. I can also say that none of the options I blathered on about above proved to be the immediate solution. I still like the idea of writing books though.

And, rebounding into the previous tangent, none of my clothes fit anymore. Not even close. A while back I was surprisingly excited about purchasing a new wardrobe. Not so much these days. I'm thinking thrift store.



Now who in the entire world saw me developing the ability to appreciate that video?

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It's many hours later, mid-afternoon, and I'm officially tired. I did a couple of interesting things between 7 a.m. and 2 p.m. (it was 98 degrees at 2 p.m.).

Firstly I hauled the Bobcat home from the south unit. No need to let it get snow-soaked, and I'm quite probably done with fencing down there for the season. I may get back to it if we get a solid Indian Summer, and if that happens hauling the thing back down there is not much of a chore.

The interesting component of this job was the way I was able to swing myself up onto the flatbed of the one-ton via the gooseneck frame. I did it without thinking, and it was easy and felt good.

I could not have done that when I loaded up and took the rig south a few months ago. I mass much less than I did back then and I'm much stronger and much more fit. I find this little bite of life a very cool thing indeed.

The other interesting thing I did was grab my vest and rifle and do the Tactical Rifleman's Challenge again. Same course, same load, same distance, same time. I had more pain than I wanted but I fought through it and it actually began to ease at the three-mile mark. I'm not sure what this means in the context of the back injections I received a month ago. They seem to have been helpful, but my body was also seeming to respond to mass reduction and fitness before the injections. I go back to see the injection/pain management doctor next Monday, so I guess we'll see what we see. It feels like I'm heading in the right direction.

Because of the breeziness and probable wind noise I didn't take any video earlier in the day. Didn't take any stills, either, because I was concentrating on work and work. In the evening I snuck out and got a few okay-ish pics and vids.

Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.

Children and fencin' and livin'

Last time I mentioned A Grief Observed, by C.S. Lewis. An unexpected charm for me is the foreword by Madeleine L'Engle, author of the A Wrinkle in Time quintet, a series I devoured when I were a lad. I knew nothing and still know nothing of the woman herself, however, I did enjoy her foreword to the Lewis book.

I mention this because L'Engle states, "It is all right to wallow in one’s journal; it is a way of getting rid of self-pity and self-indulgence and self-centeredness. What we work out in our journals we don’t take out on family and friends."

A Grief Observed (Collected Letters of C.S. Lewis) (p. 8). HarperOne. Kindle Edition.

Which makes me wonder whether I should blog at all about my own grief. It's a good question, and I'm not sure I know the proper answer.I think I'm going to continue to say and show things if it feels right to do so. I'm not planning on putting self-pity on display. Of that I've almost none, and it's overwhelmed by love and blessings. Chime in below and let me know what you think.

That said, it was a brilliant morning to share with a couple of kids.

And speaking of sharing, it can be a tricky concept to navigate.



Then came teamwork and cooperation.



Reach and grasp. What a concept.

Hide and seek?



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I have a fitness watch linked to a smartphone. Watch on the left wrist, phone on a lanyard around my neck. I keep the phone ringer and notifications on vibrate, and the vibration is mirrored by the watch. When the watch loses contact with the phone, it vibrates. So when my watch vibrates I've got a call, a message, or I've misplaced my phone. It's a system that works pretty well for me.

At first Allie took exception to the watch. She didn't like how I'd glance at the watch when it vibrated. I think it made her feel a touch insecure, like I was expecting a call from a girlfriend or wondering how soon I could leave. She said she thought I was addicted to the technology, and she may have had a point.

One day when we were hugging my watch vibrated and she felt it. She was mad until she realized that her body was blocking communication between the phone on a lanyard around my neck (and therefore between us) and the watch on my wrist. Both wrists of course, being attached to hands and arms, were wrapped around her in a loving embrace.

"My heart can stop your technology!"

"Your heart controls everything about me, Love."

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Fencing after kids. It was hot out and the work was good and physical. I got stuck in at 10 a.m. when the air temp was 80. According to the official record (properly sited and calibrated unit at the airport, less than a mile distant) the mercury only touched 87. Felt hotter than that!



There's something good and proper and vital in accomplishing a hard physical job for real reasons in the real world. A lot of people will never know what that statement even means. I'm fortunate that I do.



Today featured ups and downs, much like any other day. I lived and loved and did not simply exist.

Tomorrow promises clear skies, sunshine, and a high of 98. Typical early September weather for this part of the country. I plan to do a lot of good, solid, physical labor, and I plan to hike at least a few miles. Sunday is looking much the same for weather and planned activities. Monday will be cooler, and Monday night is expected to bring sharply colder temps -- down to 31 degrees -- and the first snow (perhaps) of the season. Again, typical early September weather.

Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.

Happy and Inertia

First thing this morning Nona and Tommy were hard at a game of tug-of-war. Tommy had (again!) dragged all the blankets out of Nona's house. Toys! Don't pay no mind to the bachelor-washed window. SMH...



Went out and threw the ball a bit. Tommy was more interested in biting Nona's tail.



I've been pushing through inertia today. In my mind I feel tired and weak physically, but when I do physical stuff I find that I'm not at all tired and weak. It's a strange phenomenon and one I didn't see coming. But hey, you either play the cards you've been dealt or you don't.

The littlest one was on a giving orders kick for a while this morning. She stomped around the living room pointing at every object in her vision -- people excluded -- and gave 'em all holy heck. "I tol' you not a do that, you stop it right now!" I think she got a lot of yuck out and at the same time exercised some actual control over stuff. It was important stuff to her, and that's what mattered. When she was done she wanted to be held quietly for a while. She burned up a lot of energy giving orders and napped hard at nap time.

Later I got a trucker salute while checking fence along the interstate.



Then I yabbered on for more than seven minutes while I hiked along. Made sense at the time but don't feel bad about skipping the video or turning the sound down.



Always a pretty view from the top of Vader Hill.



Doing laundry this afternoon I played with the dogs some more.



Over at Borepatch's place I read the news of the passing of his Mom. Such a very hard thing. He closed to post with a quote from C.S. Lewis' book, A Grief Observed:

"Her absence is like the sky, spread over everything."

I really needed to read that quote. I bought the book. It's a very good read for me just now. I'd never have known of the work were it not for the flood of condolences I received here from Borepatch and his kind readers. Pretty cool how things work.

I miss my Love desperately and our physical separation is hard to bear. But it's not too hard. Allie's family has and continues to wash me in the most remarkably wonderful love. God continues to do for me what I cannot do for myself and miracles are common coin in this new realm. I am happy. I am hurting, but I am happy.

It's been a dang good day of livin'.

Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.

Corpsman Chronicles XXXVI: Super RBOC, I think I love you (part v)

What's the difference between a fairy tale and a sea-story? A fairy tale begins, "Once upon a time..." A sea story begins, "This is no shit!"

I try to be careful to change names, but to the best of my recollection the events and locations are substantially correct. Of course I can only describe events from my perspective, so there's that. Readers who were present will doubtless have different recollections of any particular event. This is what it was like to serve in my tiny slice of the U.S. Navy between the late 1970's and early 1990's. It really was an adventure.

Here's part five of the Super RBOC saga.

Remember,

This is no shit!

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Loved this helo.

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We interrupt this series for what feels like an important announcement.

When I began this series on April Fools Day, 2020, my intent was to tell some good ripping sea stories wrapped around the kernel of an idea. I wanted to try to illustrate one of my major character defects. It felt to me at the time that many of my navy tales cast me in an undeserved light. I tried pretty hard to show how flawed a man I was (and remain), but it seemed important that I illustrate how very selfish and self centered I was and how cavalierly I most often treated other human beings. Even those I really liked. Especially those I tried to learn to love.

Between the second and third episodes of this series I fell in love in real life. For the very first time.

Not only did I fall in love, I learned very quickly what it was to give all of myself and all of my love unconditionally to another person. I found out that the reality of love is something so different than I'd ever imagined or believed that the two concepts actually exist in direct opposition. I had always assumed that love was about me.

Between the third and fourth episodes, something magical happened. My love allowed me to love all of her, unconditionally.

In a very short span of days my life went from full and round and satisfying and more than I could ever have reasonably hoped for or expected to something so much larger and better that I can't begin to properly describe it.

I've been in close contact with the Rebecca of this tale since the very beginning. She has had and will continue to have complete editorial control. It's only right and proper. Rebecca believes the tale is a good one on its own merit and might just have the potential to prod a knucklehead like myself in the proper direction somewhat earlier in life. She also notes that I was not the only knucklehead in the relationship.

Here's another miracle. Rebecca and I had a very interesting time together, then spent decades apart. She is happily married and is a proud grandma. And now, over the span of a few short months, we are real and true friends. What a treasured thing a friend is!

All of this is to say that the Super RBOC saga will continue, but it'll take a bit of time to get to the proper place to take it back up. It will also be a different story than it would have been had my life not changed so very much. On April Fools Day I was very nearly the same selfish fool I was 35 years ago, and it was therefore pretty easy to channel that knucklehead. In this week leading up to Labor Day I am rather a different fellow. It feels like I'm more complete. Getting back into the knucklehead's mind is going to take some serious effort. At a basic level it's just the retelling of an age-old story, but if I do it right it should be entertaining and maybe even helpful. We'll see.

Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.

All of it

I believe that there's something grand and majestic about the totality of our lives and of our universe. For me it's vital to look squarely -- as best I can -- at things and experiences as they actually are. My ideas of good and bad, pretty and ugly, useful and useless -- these ideas do not reflect reality as it is; they merely reveal my incompletely informed opinions of the moment.

What's in this image? Blue grama, buffalo grass, sagewort, dotted gayfeather, and a spatter of cowhit on a limestone rock that was sea bed circa 150 million years ago. Meh stuff, pretty stuff, ugly stuff, common stuff.

Such an image also reminds me of Baxter Black's poem "Reincarnation."

"What does reincarnation mean?"

A cowpoke ast his friend.

His pal replied, "It happens when

Yer life has reached it's end.

They comb yer hair, and warsh yer neck,

And clean yer fingernails,

And lay you in a padded box

Away from life's travails.

The box and you goes in a hole,

That's been dug into the ground.

Reincarnation starts in when

Yore planted 'neath the mound.

Them clods melt down, just like your box,

And you who is inside,

And then yore just beginnin' on

Yer tranformation ride.

In a while the grass will grow

Upon yer rendered mound.

Till some day on yer rendered grave

A lonely flower is found.

And say a hoss should wander by

And gaze upon that flower

That once was you, but now's become

yer vegetative bower.

The posey that the hoss done ate

Up, with his other feed,

Makes bone and fat and muscle,

Essential to the steed.

But some is left that he can't use

And so it passes through,

And finally lays upon the ground,

This thing that once was you.

Then say by chance, I wanders by

and sees this upon the ground

And I ponders, and wonders at,

This object that I found.

I thinks of reincarnation,

Of life, and death, and such,

And comes away concludin': Slim,

You ain't changed, all that much."

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Hiked and ran a bit yesterday. It was therapeutic.

More real stuff in the real world.

I can still run hills.

Just not as fast (or pretty) as I once could.

Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.

Staggering into Normalville

I used to think I knew what busy was. Heh.

At some point I'll perhaps describe in a very general way what the ever-growing mountain of tasks has looked and felt like. In general the priority has to be direct care of kids during a particularly hard time. A concurrent priority is to accomplish all the bureaucratic tasking required to ensure the best possible ongoing lives for the kids. That's where the ever growing mountain springs from -- the bureaucratic state. You really can't imagine the immense wrongness of 2020 'murka unless you have to navigate through that place. It is honestly the antithesis of the shining ideas and ideals of the United States of America.

Tough sledding. But there are good and sufficient reasons to do it and do it correctly.

Allie's sister and the little ones.



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I also used to think that God sometimes gave me hard stuff to test me. Now I know for certain that I was mistaken. Hard stuff is just part of livin' stuff. The things that God is doing through me are miracles.

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Why do I do a "good deed?" More importantly, why did I make a video of the good deed? Is it simply a selfish man patting himself on the back? It's important for me to ask such questions and work hard to find answers.



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Baked bread for the family today. This is all I captured of the process!



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I took some time to work on washing clothes. Allie's clothes. It's a hard chore but it must be done. With our recent move, living life, and then her passing, there is a lot of clothes to wash. Clothes loved Allie and she gave a lot of them a home.

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Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

Dead?

Nope. Comfortable.

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Yesterday is gone and tomorrow isn't here or even assured. We ape-lizards have the capacity to remember and to plan, and these tools are mighty boons. But as with any tool, they can both build and raze, and the stuff they build can be just stuff, good stuff, or bad stuff.The choice is always ours; it is ever and only owned by the individual human being.

Today is the place we actually live. We navigate life from moment to moment, just as nature does. In the slice of universe we occupy we only move forward through time. We can't move backwards and we can't stop.

We human beings can and often do spend time remembering and planning. We can also, if we decide to, attempt to ignore the present by concentrating our mind power on what once was and what might possibly be. If we sail too far into those waters, we will enter a part of the sea of life which is clearly marked on our charts, "Here There Be Dragons."

The waters surrounding Mare Draconum are safe and lovely and we must sail them. They give us succor and comfort and possibility and most importantly Hope.

It's also important to sail into Mare Draconum from time to time. There are precious treasures there and in order to actually live our life, we must seek and win those treasures. But we must ever be mindful that if we founder in that part of the ocean we will surely be consumed.

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Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.

Good and timely nature question

Morning in Kimball, August 27, 2020.



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Cattle on a hot summer day.

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John Blackshoe posed a good and timely nature question in a comment to my previous post.

Nature question, when you have time. "Short grass prairie" is what you have. Not sure if it is short because your cows keep it neatly trimmed, or the vegetation/moisture doesn't let it grow taller.
Over on the Pacific coast where they get lots of rain, and therefore lots of vegetation-grasses and trees- they get lots of wildfires. Get into timber country and they get them too, lots from lightning, too many from stupid ape lizards. I don't recall hearing about many many prairie fires in NE/CO/KS, although they were a fearsome factor in pioneer times, and subject of several dramatic paintings. All part of nature's surprises, I guess. So, do you get many fires in your region?

As the name suggests, short grass prairie refers to a grassland ecosystem where the stature/speciation of the grasses is shorter than mixed or tall grass prairie ecosystems.

In general, grass stature is most highly correlated with precipitation. Speciation is also correlated with precipitation. Of course precipitation is basically the supply source for water, and plants take up water for the soil, so measured precipitation is really just a proxy for the important thing, which is soil moisture. Or even more precisely, moisture in the soil which is actually available for uptake by plant root systems. There's more detail here.

In this part of the country where the stature of the grassland ecosystem is comparatively short, there is comparatively less fuel load per unit of measure, and therefore not as much stuff to burn when fires start. Land topography is generally more flat, there is generally more fallow or bare farm ground, and there are generally more roads. This combination provides for fire breaks and for quite rapid response to wild fires. The population density is very small, so direct human impact is also very small.

In a nutshell, we have wildfires around here all the time, but they only rarely get so big and out of control that they become newsworthy or cast a lot of smoke downwind.

Where do our wildfires come from? It's the usual suspects. Lightning and people. During a dry year, which this year certainly qualifies as, the Kimball Rural Fire Department gets called out into the country 2-3 times each week. We've been getting a lot of essentially rainless thunderstorms, so lightning often strikes dry grass or crop residue and there's not enough rain to quench any fires that start. Farmers harvesting grain start a lot of fires too, because tractors, trucks, and combines have internal combustion which sometimes leaks out and moving parts can get hot and/or produce sparks. It's just not uncommon at all for a farmer to lose an entire field of grain plus several trucks and combines to a wheat or millet field fire.

As to dryness, average January-August precipitation is 13.1 inches. Thus far in 2020 we've measured 9.2 inches. So it's pretty dry.

Several years ago in the autumn we had a fire on the south unit sparked by downed power lines. It was quite a frightening experience for me and I was quite thankful for the RFD's prompt and professional response.

So yes, we get 'em, and they can be big and bad, but they impact relatively few ape-lizards, don't make a lot of smoke, and don't victimize the professional victim class so they're rarely reported by the artists formerly known as reporters.

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Ice cream!



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Dotted Gayfeather, a favorite late-summer wildflower.



More of the same. It was very hot. My Dad's cairn is on the south side of the fence.



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Evening in Kimball, August 27, 2020.



We're soldiering on. The youngest had been on a counting kick for several months; she delighted in being able to enumerate objects up to five. "One, two, free, four, five!" The last few days she's been counting "Mommie, Shaun, Gabe, Zeke, Evie." It's part of her little two year old grieving process. It's not even the tiniest bit different than mine. There's sorrow and joy, sadness and hope in that. We have a home filled with love while many do not. It's a blessing.

Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.

Goldfish syndrome

Don't recall when or where I first came across the concept, but the core of the thing is that for the tiny-brained goldfish, every time it swims around the inside of its bowl it discovers an entirely new world.

Most days I wonder if I'm any smarter or more advanced than a goldfish.

I do know that I have a bad habit of convincing myself that I fully understand situations and solutions. Almost every single time I eventually find that I understood neither situation nor solution. I often get close, but little yet incredibly important details get missed or overlooked and adversely affect the solutions I try to implement. It can be a problem.

Fortunately for me nature and reality are excellent and infinitely patient instructors. If I do my part, however imperfectly, I have an ongoing stream of opportunities to learn and grow. Seems like learning and growing are an important part of livin'.

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This morning is a struggle. For a couple of weeks my nights have featured a form of "sleep" which I've never experienced before. The last two nights I had something more akin to sleep, and I was certainly not conscious, but again it was something different. There was more unconscious time, which was almost certainly restorative, but this morning in particular it's a hard struggle to do even the simplest thing. I feel wrung out and exhausted and I'm not enjoying that. Irritable also, and I detest that feeling.

It is what it is, and I understand intellectually and even spiritually that it's all part of a process. In that sense it's okay, but it's still a struggle.

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Yesterday morning was a beautiful morning.

It was a beautiful morning in town, complete with a red sun in a smoley sky.

It was a beautiful morning out in nature, out on the ranch.

I often try to express the beauty of the days here in this part of the world and sometimes I feel I'm being a bit tedious with that, constantly yabbering on about how beautiful things are.

I think there are several things going on inside me when I'm bubbling over with comments about the beauty I see and feel.

First and perhaps most obvious, this place does have inherent natural beauty. It's a complex grassland/prairie ecosystem and that's a beautiful thing in and of itself. It also exists in a particular geographical location across which weather and atmosphere are constantly moving, therefore the observable face of this shortgrass prairie site is ever changing. For the casual observer it might often look the same from day to day, but to the daily visitor it never looks the same. That feels beautiful to me also.

Less obvious, perhaps, is the beauty that fills my mind and heart and soul when I am present in that place. It's a special experience for me. I go there every day and have done so countless times over the long/short decades, across time and seasons. I've grown to feel the flow of seasons and years and they have become part of me. Ot I've become part of it.

Being a part of the ecosystem, along with the cattle and my labor/operations/management, lends a fullness and roundness to my life which is a huge blessing and for which I am ever grateful.



Yesterday I also got a great deal of physical labor type work done. I harvested steel posts and then I bent my efforts to repairing/maintaining fence. It was good work and I got a lot done so it was a very good day from that perspective.

In harvesting posts, and I think I've touched on this before, what I actually do is remove posts from still standing but disused and unneeded internal ranch fence lines.



In a way those fence lines are a form of storage for wood posts, steel posts, and even barbed wire. The fence lines probably appear to be untidy and improper, and in some ways they are. Yet in our "one-man-band" low input cost of operations, cleaning them up would represent time and effort we cannot afford to expend. At least not right now. And surprisingly, they do provide very good storage. In place they don't take up space elsewhere, they are pretty much out of the way, and nature does not tread too heavily on them. One downside is that when I want to use any of those materials, I have to go out and spend the time and energy to gather them. It's not a complete downside though because that time and energy contribute directly to my overall wellbeing. I get to spend productive time outside, walking in nature's beauty, and the labor is all exercise. So harvesting posts gives me a fitness boost, and emotional boost, a mental boost, and a spiritual boost. It's a win-win, even when (especially when) unanticipated challenges arise.



As far as yesterday's physical labor went, I worked very, very hard. It was hot and the air was filled with smoke. There was barely a touch of breeze. I got overheated and dehydrated, and as I've been paying scant (read zero) attention to proper diet of late I reached a profound state of exhaustion. It was a good thing in a way, but also vexing. I wanted to do more, and I demand more of myself than I can possibly give, so I was a bit cross at my physical weakness. I was also cross at myself for not attending better to my own physical needs. I'm flailing and that's a fact, but it's also part of the process. While I am making dumb mistakes -- and will continue to do so for the rest of my days -- I do also learn from my mistakes. Not always well, but over time I'm trending in the right direction.

At any rate, here's a bit of incoherent stream of consciousness springing directly from the low ebb of my physical/mental/emotional state. I hope it's not too awful to watch, but if it is, just click it off. I won't mind. If you soldier through, perhaps in some way it might even be helpful to someone, somewhere, sometime. That would be nice.



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This morning, while I was stewing in my irritation and lethargy and deeply mired in feeling sorry for myself, God threw a beautiful miracle at me. As he always does. That I can see and appreciate such things is perhaps a sign of growth, perhaps a sign that someday I might even become a big kid.



Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.

Update on the back

And other things...

Yesterday (August 23) evening on the ranch. I'd just finished several hours of fence work with many miles walked and was feeling good-tired and satisfied. I was pretty babbly and quite possibly incoherent. I've had a lot of that of late but it seems to be easing as I work through the process.



A bit later, in town, I paused to video the smokey-cloudy evening sky. I was interrupted by the oinkers and my own mushy brain. I was (and continue to be) quite vexed by all the people who believe all the tee-vee news all the time. Worst fires ever? Why is it that so very many people can't/won't recall last August, and the August before, and the August before? Why do so very many people let the tee-vee operate their brains?



Breakfast of Champions; an olio of leftover kids morning scrambled eggs and lunchtime spaghettios. Which I bolted down before embarking on fence work. Yummy! Seriously!

On August 4 I had targeted injections of steroid into the areas of my lumbar spine which are home to the root causes of the radiculopathy I've been dealing with for a long time.

The injections were quite extensive and it took a few days for the trauma of the needle to fade, but the steroids seem to have helped a lot. It's nothing like a complete cure so far, but the reduction in symptoms is very good indeed.

I was finally able to get back to exercising on Saturday. The last real exercise session I'd had was on August 1 when I took the Tactical Rifleman's Challenge and humped 51 pounds of rifle, ammo, and gear five miles over prairie. That was a grinding toil and doing the hike in an hour and fifteen minutes was very hard work. I had a lot of pain but was able to fight through it and recover to very little pain quickly. That was good exercise, a good, smashing workout for my whole body, and an indication that my body continues to make accomodations and keeps on trying to heal the nerve pain problem. I've done my part by losing a hell of a lot of weight, eating a proper and supportive diet, and keeping fit.

On Saturday (August 22) I did another five-miler, this time sans rifle and gear. In the course of the hike I ran steps and sprinted (for certain values of sprinted) Smokebong Hill 11 times. The hill is a progressive slope that gets very steep toward the top and is two-tenths of a mile. So 11 sprints up and 11 walks down. I've mentioned this before but it's probably worth repeating; running uphill spreads the impact forces over time and across bone and joint geometry and articulation. This seems to reduce the pounding to a non-traumatic level while properly stretching and working feet and legs, hips and pelvis, and the spine. All of this seems to be good and helps reduce radiculopathy. I took some video of the workout but my phone flipped all the images. Not important, but I did want to share the smokey vista and an audiovisual representation of my feats of prowess (ha!).

In addition, I've been working on fence each day since Friday and I've got no shortage of that to keep me well occupied. Working on fence is very therapeutic; physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. I'm very fortunate indeed to be able to have such a productive and useful outlet.

Anything better than a candy bar?

She loves "chocat canny bar" and loves to wash her hands after. The face takes a bit of work, but she's really into washing those hands. Such precious moments. Livin' life is grand when you slow it down to savor the beautiful stuff.



On the topic of sweets, I developed the habit of baking cookies for Allie and the kids. I have a great recipe for oatmeal-cherry-chocolate chip. With both white and dark chips. Allie loved them and of course the kids would hoover up a whole batch at a time if allowed. The cookies never lasted long, so I frequently made more.

Several weeks ago I took the empty container to my other house which is where I always baked. Never found the time to move my baking stuff to the new house. Anyway, a couple of days later Allie asked me if I'd washed the container yet. I hadn't, and me and my dumb ass thought she was concerned about my shoddy bachelor cleaning habits. This morning I found out why she had asked. It was an exceptionally precious moment of discovery.

Five hearts. Allie, three kids, me.

Be well and embrace the blessings of liberty.