Monday

As I backed out of our driveway with Snowdrop in the back seat, she asked me several times -- are you sure it's Monday? I share her confusion. For her it was just a question of homework: normally her teacher assigns homework for the week on the first day back: Monday. But none had been distributed and some late entries (from last week?) were being collected and so it felt more like a Friday, but since that was definitely not right, she was gunning for maybe Tuesday?

For me, it was less about the ordering of day's assignments and more about the unusual nature of this whole week: I have four appointments, on four successive days, even though if you asked Ed, I should have none. So every day is disrupted, and feels weird, and because I have Snowdrop in the afternoons, time has suddenly twisted itself into a mush of imperfect hours, where I do nothing well, even as at the end of the day, it all comes out okay.

What four appointments? Well, two date back to loose ends still being tied up from my Mystery Disease in September. Some of them should be shut down soon, others will continue until there is no more breath left to the investigation. The other two are regular creaky joints stuff. 

I asked Ed today why, unlike me, he chooses to bypass investigations of potential health issues. 

Because of exactly what you are going through -- he tells me. Endless visits for possible problems, even as chances are you would do fine without the visits. 

But what if you're missing important information?

When it is obvious that something is wrong, then I'll consider going to the doctor. I weigh my odds.

I've commented on this before: he is entirely sensible in his approach. At the same time, I am sensible in mine: if a doc says "you might want to check out X" I check out X.

So, shortly after the animal feeding, the breakfast, the cats trampling over our morning meal...

I leave for the clinic.

One thing I will say is that none of my doc visits are unpleasant. I like all my medical people here. They're interesting, knowledgeable folk, and when we are not analyzing data on this or that, we oftentimes have informative conversations. Today's doc asked me where my accent comes from.

Now, if you have never heard me speak, I am telling you -- save some time on the evening of January 26, because I have an LaS presentation which you can Zoom-join from just about anywhere (more on that on another day). If you listen then, you can send me an email telling me if you, too, hear an accent. Some people do, some don't. Those that do, think I am Dutch or German. 

I told my doc that wearing a mask probably makes me sound even less like a native Wisconsinite, and this brought us around to the topic of Covid, mask wearing, and the like. Two points that stuck with me: one is that he agreed with me that seniors are being poorly treated by the culture wars that lead to the politicization of mask wearing (well yeah! how does a senior feel traveling in a pandemic surrounded by unmasked, possibly infected other travelers? kind of antsy!). Secondly, though, he noted that the antivaxxers are even worse: his mother is one of them. She eventually got Covid and suffered terribly, helped only by the availability of Paxlovid, which he insisted she take. Now I ask you -- if the mom of a University Hospitals doctor doesn't believe in the efficacy of a Covid vaccine, what hope is there for us all?

We then turned to a discussion of skiing, just to get off the depressing topic of Covid.

In other words, despite Ed's weighing of the costs/benefits, I don't consider my time in clinics necessarily wasted. If you come out with good results, well then that's great! If not -- hey, good thing you had a chance to fix the problem before it fixed you! And if you had a couple of good, informative conversations in the meantime -- you come out a smarter person! Win win.

On the way from school, Snowdrop and I talked about what kind of shops we'd like to see in the new development within walking distance of the farmette. (Ed and I took a quick spin around those blocks just for the exercise, so the topic was fresh on my mind.) Ice cream shop. Coffee shop. She thought a hot dog place would be fun. Maybe we were hungry because every alternative had the focus on food. We drove by the buildings were shops are being planned and so long as we were there, Snowdrop begged to pause at the playground, where she took a spin on her favorite climbing/hanging equipment. 

I didn't have my jacket so I talked her down to a five minute play period. As we got back in the car she mused about how neat it was to have that development, with its bike path (she first rode a bike there), the potential of food shops, the playground. Maybe I'll live there someday when I am older -- she mused.

Oh, that would sure be nice! -- I responded with a smile.

Gaga, you'll be.... (here she caught herself and went silent, not wanting to hurt my feelings)

Dead? Well maybe. But maybe not. People often move out of their homes by the time they're in their twenties. We did the math. She wasn't convinced, but hey, you never know!

At the farmhouse, reading took up 90% of our time. 

(to read or to play.... hmmm... reading wins!)

And then she went home and I settled in for an evening of leftovers. Finally, I caught up with the day. I even wrote this post before midnight. Fantastic!