No more Summer Projects for Ric!!!!!

Jill, The one eye doesn't work, been there... I've tried all the tricks. I'm already able to focus one eye with both open for years, it's a marksman thing. I've never been sea sick either, but can now appreciate those that have been. I walk like a landlubber and reel like a wino. What a joy! LOL
Stormy, Holly can cook, she just never needs to most of the time. I may have roasted the pork but she made all the fixins.
Tomorrow is Jubilee Day in Mechanicsburg, and I'm going to miss it. It's billed as the largest 1 day street fair in the country with food, vendors, food, free concerts, food, and kids activities. Did I mention the food? LOL I used to schedule the day off to attend. It's become even more fun since JR can go with me, I took his daddy for years, even after he got too old to hang with me and banged around with his friends after accepting a clandestine ride to town. I'm just so thankful I was done at my dad's and home when this happened, I just wish I'd been more caught up with the yard work 1st. Ric

I'm having a ball laughing at all these illnesses. Wait, that didn't sound rihgt...
I'm having a ball with the comments around these ailments. Thats better. HAHA picturing Jill the sailor with the moveable eye patch - Hey, didn't Marty Feldman do that in Young Frankenstein? "Abby something...Abby Normal"
No its' Calamity Jill the sharpshooter. Thats why she did well with the eyepatch.

Now I have a hankering for pork roast. Just missed good sale on tenderloin. Saw a very interesting show last night all about pigs. The babies pick a teat and stick with it. The reasearcher markd seven piglets with big numbers, scrambled them, and they all went back in corrrect order. It was pretty funny Darn, now I am feeling a tiny bit guilty about wanting that pork roast. Pigs have an incredible growth rate. and birth rate. Guess I'll stop going on about pigs...

I have wished I'd put my camera in a bagie so I wouldn't haev to peel off gloves, or risk getting compost int he camera crevices. My phone folds so I guess I couldn't bag that too well, well I guess I could.actually, on the half with the buttons.

"Calamity Jill" LOL, You crack me up Sally. For those of you who don't know, on another website where we discuss all of our hobbies and past times, Critter told us all about her early career on the high school shooting team! LOL, just picturing her with the gun or bow & arrow, wearing her eye patch.

Ric, are you any better today? I know that Holly can cook, I was just teasing her. I know that she prefers your cooking, or at least that you spend YOUR time doing it. LOL And she thought that she'd be dropping a few lbs, while you were laid up. Heh Heh!

Sally, it's a mad scramble trying to get my flip phone out of the baggie when it rings. But, that's better than ruining a few phones a summer. I've never taken my Ipod into the garden for fear of ruining it. I've had to shake the dirt out of my zoom on more than one occasion. Not a good thing!

I am getting better, I think. I woke up this morning and hopped out of bed, saw a glass of tea next to the bed and picked it up, as I tilted back my head to swallow it, I abruptly sat on the bed and remembered why I shouldn't do that.LOL My vision is definitely improved, and Holly said I shuffle much quicker and don't hold my arms out like a landlubber on a rolling deck. I'm just glad I didn't come back from Florida with a peg leg and eye patch. That would have really messed up this past week. LOL Ric

Ric, I'm so glad you're doing a bit better. I know you won't listen to me, but -- don't overdo it today! Your brain is getting all these totally messed-up signals from your inner ear, and the more you push the issue and try to make your brain make sense of the misinformation, the more exhausted you're going to be... and you need your strength to recover from the infection.

Getting kind of hot out there today. Ric I suggest an easy mornng and a PM rest under the gazebo. Get your head comfy and reclined a bit and don't move it much. Then clo o o o se your eyes...
stormy, as I typed my thing about the baggie I thought, I COULD open the phone, bag the button side , and then close it. I think. Or wrap the button side with Saran, or Press and Seal.

Sally, I found I could, with a little trial and effort, operate my flip phone in a light weight, quart size, zip lock. Especially out in the boat and fishing. I don't even open the bag. An errant salt spray or soaking downpour would be fatal to the phone not to mention the fishy stuff making you and your phone persona non gratis. I also have the local Coast Guard # programed ICE, it's easier that maintaining a marine radio for occasional use and good for inshore use. Ric

Smart move, Ric! I mean carrying the phone on the boat. A good friend and coworker and her daughter died in a boat accident several years ago. They were out on the ocean, the boat flipped. No one had a cell phone even though her husband had reminded her just before they left to be sure to take hers.

Her BIL, who was with them, spent the entire night trying to pull the boat closer in to shore with my friend and her daughter clinging to the underside. They both died of exposure sometime during the night. The Coast Guard found him the next morning. He did survive.

But if they'd just had a cell phone, they'd have been found in time.

Listen to Critter, Ric. Don't get cocky just because you're feeling a bit better.

Ric, I always Ziplock my cell phone when sailing and canoeing. On the sailboat, whenever we come about, the movements are so abrupt and quick and the boat can tilt so much, that my phone's often fallen out of my pocket. Of course, if it's been really windy with high seas, the boat always has water on the floor, not to mention running over the seats. I have tucked it into my bra, which keeps it more secure, but then I've ruined them there, just from sweating on them!! Same with Bluetooths. DSO and my nieces and nephews have overturned the canoe on more than one occasion!! I ziplock the phone & cameras at the beach too. Sand is just as bad in electronics as garden dirt.

Sad story, Hart. Why don't people think? No phone, no flares. No radio. I'd never go boating like that. Heck, nowadays, I don't go gardening like that!! LOL With Ric, I suppose that Holly uses the sound of power tools for a tracking beacon. LOL

As I recall, there was a radio but it was underwater once the boat flipped. My friend's husband called the Coast Guard when they weren't home on time but they couldn't find them until the next day. I felt so sorry for him, he was beyond devastated. Their daughter was only 9, maybe 8.

What a sad sad story. We watched one of those I shouldn't be alive kind of stories the other night, about sailing. It just seeems to me who admittedly knows nothing about sailing, that they could have had SOME kind of better emergency precautions. Boat flippd and sank, all thrown out with only the dinghy, lost the survival boat with all the supplies. An emergency beacon like they are talking about requiring on mountain hikers?

Yes, Sally. Today they make hand held small waterproof portable marine radios that emit tracking signals. They cost less than $200 and are about the size of a walky talky.

That's great...and i sure hope you go out with one because we can't take any chances on YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What a great device! I assume even if you dropped it in the water, it would still be giving out a signal.

I think people often underestimate the power of nature. When we had the bad flooding here in '95, a couple camping with their granddaughter ignored warnings to leave. The next morning, they were washed away by a 20 foot wall of water that came rushing down the creek next to their campground. They survived by hanging onto tree branches but their three year old granddaughter toddled into the water trying to get to them. Her body was found several days later. It was horrible.

So enough cheerful stories from me. My cell phone doesn't work at home so I haven't had to worry about putting it in a ziploc bag. Sometimes I carry the cordless phone out with me but I leave on it the porch or somewhere nearby where I can hear it but it won't get sprayed with water or dirt.

LOL Happy Father's Day Ric!!

Hart, all of these modern conveniences are wonderful and truly life saving for us gardeners and boaters.....providing you're not like me and CRS anymore. I try to return the camera INSIDE as soon as I'm done using it. If I see something later on that I want to photo, I'll go back in and get it. I never take the house phone outside any more and consequently am using it less and less. I did leave it outside once, but fortunately the patio umbrella protected it enough that it's still working.

Just this AM, I was stumbling around the kitchen for my first cup of Jo, looking for my favorite coffee mug. Of course I found it later out on my potting bench! I try never to take them outside, for breakage. But I was being rushed yesterday by DSO and forgot to use my thermal cup. Sounds like you and Marshall would be good candidates for those cell phones that are combo walkie talkies too.

LOL just now before I was finished typing this, a neighbor stopped by and told me they'd closed my car trunk lid which was partly open. Good thing it didn't rain last night! Sheesh, maybe I'll have to charge the car battery charger too.

This message was edited Jun 20, 2010 5:54 PM

Cell phones don't work out here at all, Stormy. We have mountains about a mile away all around and nobody wants to build a tower out here. When I'm driving home, the cellphone is useless from about 12-15 miles from here.

I never leave my camera outside or even set it down outside. I carry it out, take photos and take it back inside. I guess I really had taking care of good cameras drummed into me at the newspapers.

What I am always losing is my garden hand tools. I do most everything with my trusty hand adze, which has a chopping thing on one end and claws on the other. But if I take anything else, I will invariably set it down somewhere without thinking. I'm looking for my trowel right now because I put it down somewhere and forgot where I left it.

We got some little walkie-talkies to use at the beach, and before Jim & I both had cell phones we'd take them to places like Sam's Club or the mall.

At the beach, Mom & I take one down with us when we're fishing... that way we can call up to the house where folks are hanging around on the deck and get somebody to bring us more bait, or a new hook, or whatever (hey, can't take time out to hike up to the house and back when the fish are biting! LOL).

Happy Father's Day guys and you girls too! Things were even better today, fairly level with improved vision, still feels like I'm squinting into the sun with a mild headache. Sunday comics was about the most reading I want to do yet. I don't even want to drive till my vision clears completely. I did a accomplish a good bit of weeding, a move in the right direction.
Got a nice Echo leaf blower/vac for Father's day, great timing, my old one gave up the ghost. Cheers! Ric

So glad you're feeling better, Ric. And sounds like you had a great Fathers' Day.

Yes he is getting around better. He sat out all day on the garage creeper moving back the walk as he weeded. That's JR fresh out of the pool helping.

Doc started me on Antivert yesterday to help with the balance problem, I'm still moving about like Lurch. The incongruity between visual perception and balance makes life interesting to say the least. I don't dig with a shovel as much as I dance with it, and Heaven forbid I pick up a hoe. LOL It's still safer to weed on my knees. The doc said give it another week. Can't get much built when you gotta' use one of the pieces to prop yourself up, maybe I should try a comedy video instead. Ric

I hate to laugh but the mental picture I got made me!!!!! dancing with the shovel... I sure hope it goes away, now!!

Glad, if I gave you a chuckle, I gotta' laugh about it or the boredom sets in. Being inactive is driving me crazy. Ric

man I can only imagine so! Maybe thisis why God made weeds. There are always some to sit and pull no matter what. Should I run out and buy you a litttle birdhouse kit to put together? like summer camp crafts. You could decorate it with macaroni glued on ''snicker''

Sally, Been there, done that! I didn't have macaroni, so I used a stencil and paints even though Holly wanted a gold macaroni roof. LOL Ric

OOPS! Forgot the pic.

Very nice! Too bad there's only so many birdhouses a crafty, MO' POWER guy like you wants to do.

This reminds me of the old (unfair criticism) saying about teachers--thoe who can, do, those who can't , teach.

Those who can, are too busy and those who can't are bored spitless wishing they could!!!

Ric, it may be hard to keep a good man down, bit it sounds like it's harder on the man! Hope you get better soon.

LOL Don't you girls believe him those bird houses are an old craft project of JR's and mine. LOL
His idea of taking it easy is pulling the wheel off my car so he could check out the funny noise. The things he can't do is just driving him crazy, hope he is back to normal soon.

I will be looking up the side effects for the Meclizine I'm taking for my dizziness to see if it can be psychotropic. The dreams that have waken me up the past 2 nights are like Steven King meets John Irving, (Cider House Rules). They include people and places I don't think I've thought about in 35 years in very sinister and ridiculous plots in such clarity it's downright weird. Unless they gave me Mescaline ILO Meclizine. LOL Ric

Check it out Ric. That would worry me too.
Then sell your leftovers on eBay. (just kidding)

LOL Like seeing things through a window pane, Ric???

Ah, a connoisseur. I guess you don't remember the 70's either. LOL Ric

Went to see an ENT doc today, he checked me over, ordered a MRI, and a neurology consult. He said everything is fairly normal for an inner ear virus, except they usually begin to clear up in 7-10 days and don't usually cause vision problems. I guess we'll see. Ric

Praying that all will be well! Sometimes those viruses can cause localized swelling and inflammation, which can prolong the recovery process and temporarily impact the optic nerve or occular muscles (at least that's what I was told way back when).

I'm sure there will be good answer, and do not worry just because there are fancy tests to do . You're such an exceptional guy, of course you get exceptional viruses!!

Sally, I'm not sure I'm buying the exceptional part. We used to tell our daughter Jen, that line, she didn't get a rash, she got shingles, and her list goes on. LOL But thank you for the wishes.
Jill, The optic nerve is in close enough proximity to be effected by an infection or swelling of the endolymphatic sac. Ric