Sunday, January 23, 2022

Day 4413

Life is full of surprises. I had to take Janet to the ER this evening because she had unusually high blood pressure. A systolic reading of over 200 seems alarming to me. The ER doctors did a lot of tests but didn't seem nearly as alarmed as we were. Something is wrong though. It doesn't seem right for blood pressure to dramatically spike overnight. We quickly discovered that Sunday night is not the best time to have a medical problem. Doctors rarely give you their personal cell phone number and a lot of the little neighborhood ER clinics that have sprung up all over town aren't even open. The first place we went to had a sign on the door saying that they closed at 5 PM. Too bad it was 6:15. 

We ended up going to a small hospital that rarely gets trauma patients. If we had gone to one of the large hospitals we would have been waiting for hours. Gunshot wounds and car accidents take priority over high blood pressure. I'm really glad now that my gallbladder problem happened during regular working hours. My doctor helped me bypass all the red tape and get admitted to the hospital very quickly. On the weekend, you are on your own. Janet is home now and seems fine. She'll go see her regular doctor in the morning. I've always thought it was a lot easier to find an emergency vet for your dog at night than to deal with your own after hours emergencies. Tonight's experience did nothing to change my mind.

The rest of our day was pretty normal. The weather was pleasant and Dawn got a nice Sunday outing. I had trouble keeping up with Dawn and Janet because this wasn't a good foot day for me. Janet tried a new "Calming Collar" on Dawn during the ride to the park. I didn't think it would work, and sure enough it didn't. They probably just infused the collar with Lavender Oil or other new age gimmick. Lets face it. Dawn is always going to freak out in the car. She's fine when we get to our destination and I guess that's all that counts. Ice cream actually works a lot better than the Calming Collar with Dawn. Ice cream cones do a great job of calming her down.

When I took my long walk later in the afternoon my feet hurt so bad that I wasn't able to complete my regular route. This hasn't happened in a long time. It's just as well that I took a shorter walk today. The park was so crowded that it wasn't even enjoyable. A Springlike day in the middle of Winter brings the people out in droves. I enjoy walking in inclement weather more because I have the place to myself. I think the eagles had the same idea. They were nowhere to be found this afternoon.

I made a feeble effort to clean out the office today. I threw away a bunch of empty boxes and old mail. I need to continue throwing away empty boxes in the storage warehouse as well. I always used to save these things in case we moved. We're not going to move though. I should have realized that years ago.  I also tried to dust a few shelves that held the remains of my model train collection. Most of the trains went to my dealer friend who's been trying to sell them for several years, but a few slipped through the cracks. There was a thick layer of dust on the models and they were surprisingly difficult to clean. I spent several hours on this futile effort and only managed to clean a single shelf. Unfortunately, dozens of dusty shelves still remain.

When Janet was checking her blood pressure at home, I got out my wireless blood pressure monitor to compare with Janet's monitor to see if hers might be faulty. It turns out that mine was the faulty one. The cuff wouldn't pump up anymore. I changed the batteries, but the cuff still wouldn't inflate properly. One more broken thing to fix now. I think the old fashioned mechanical blood pressure monitors were much more reliable. You just can't depend on batteries or devices that require a cell phone app to work.

I'm not sure if we'll be visiting the Dalmatians tomorrow. I guess it depends on when Janet can get a doctor's appointment. I'm not sure if I'll be doing much walking either. Today's walk wasn't very auspicious. Maybe I need to rest for a few days. Maybe we all need to rest for a few days.