Vegas in the Fall
As some of my gentle readers might recall, I had bit of a health issue this past winter. A heart attack to be specific, and some surgery – quad bypass - followed soon after. Due to this interruption in my “normal” way of life, my wife and I had to cancel a cruise we had been planning. I guess I could have possibly gone on it, but realistically it was way too soon after the surgery and my recovery would have still been ongoing. I was weak and not yet done getting well. It was not an ideal situation for a cruise. So we canceled it and also canceled the airfare tickets for the flight, which was to take us to the cruise port. Southwest Airlines is nice enough to allow you to use the money you spend on flights you have to cancel on other flights as long as they are booked within a year, so our deadline was around the end of November. My wife and I discussed the options and decided to use the airfare money on a trip to Las Vegas in October.
Last week we used it and this blog is a bit of an account of that trip and a few things we did while we were there.
Come along with us if you like.
We flew out of Cleveland this time instead of Columbus. Better deal on the tickets. We noted that Hopkins Airport still has a very awkward entrance to the ticketing counter from where the off-site parking shuttle busses drop you off. Through an unheated plastic-sheet walled kind of entrance, then down an escalator, across a large area and back up another escalator to the ticket counters. I’m hoping what’s there now is temporary as they seem to have been remodeling forever, but it just could just as likely be just poor design. Our Southwest Airlines flight was comfortable and we were into Vegas early on a Sunday morning. We used Uber from the airport for the first time and it worked quite well besides being noticeably less expensive than a taxi would have been (a little more than half as much). We stayed on the strip this time at Bally’s. I’d asked for hotel suggestions from an old friend and he suggested this one. (Thanks Jim!) Prices were higher than I’d have liked, but it was center strip and it was Vegas.
My brother Chuck flew into town from where he lives in San Jose, California to join us. It was great having him around to share this vacation. He was scheduled for knee-replacement surgery the following week, so he was a bit anxious most of the time.
(Side note: the surgery went fine and he’s happily convalescing now.)
I think I’ll break a bit with tradition here and not give you a day-by-day account of our time in Sin City, but just recall some of the highlights of our five days there. Be assured that we did a lot of walking and wandering around the hotels and casinos along the strip, having the occasional adult beverage here and there, checking out the people everywhere and soaking up the unique abiance that only Las Vegas seems to be able to impart. We saw an abundance of street performers who ran the gamut from a silver-painted gladiator to topless girls wanting to have their picture taken with you. For a price of course. (The girl’s tops were painted on.) Then there were musicians of various accomplishments on all kinds of instruments. And we must not forget the street people begging for money. Not a huge amount of them, but there were there.
We took in a show one afternoon at Harrah’s just up the street from our place. I ordered tickets from my netbook in the hotel room for the Mac King comedy/magic show for the three of us, but Mac was on hiatus for a while and we saw his replacement instead. Quite a funny guy and we enjoyed ourselves.
One day we took a ride on the “High Roller”. This is a huge Ferris-type wheel that overlooks the strip. It is 520 feet in diameter and advertises itself as the world’s tallest observation wheel. It has 28 glass-enclosed cabins holding 40 people each. Your ride lasts ½ hour for a full revolution. We rode it in the late morning and there were only five of us in our pod so we had great views in all directions. The sights of the city from the top of the wheel were remarkable and I snapped a ton of pictures from there. Definitely a high point in our trip, literally and figuratively.
On Tuesday we took a break from the city and visited the Grand Canyon in nearby Arizona. If you checked the distance from where we were to the canyon you would see it’s somewhere around 270 miles.
We did it by bus.
It was quite a long day as you might imagine. We left Las Vegas around 7 a.m. and returned somewhere around 11 p.m. About ten minutes into Arizona our bus’s air conditioning went kaput along with its wi/fi and we spent about 90 minutes at a roadside stop waiting for a replacement vehicle. Lots of views of creosote bushes and raw rock mountains. When we finally arrived at the Grand Canyon we were actually there for about three hours. And the canyon was, as advertised, magnificent! I’m sure you’ve seen pictures. And, of course we took pictures also. But none of them could or would ever do justice to the actuality of the place. Gigantic, huge, gorgeous, incredible, breathtaking, colorful, awe-inspiring, deep, one-of-a-kind, and etc. and more etc. Pick your favorite adjective(s) and describe away. It was cooler there than in Vegas. Higher altitude. We wore sweatshirts and were comfortable, but it wouldn’t be much later in the year when it would be outright cold there. The bus dropped us off at two places. At the second one my brother and I walked to the trailhead of the Bright Angel Trail – the one you’ve seen the mules going up and down on. You could see bits and pieces of the trail as it descended over a mile from where we stood. There are NO railings on this trail, so yours truly only walked down the first hundred feet or so before my acrophobia started kicking in and I had to sit and relax for a bit. I was quite happy when I was again back on the rim and had a sturdy railing to hang onto between me and all that thin air. To put it in a nutshell, it was a long day in a bus seat, but the payoff was truly worth it.
A side note. Our bus held 24 young travelers from Ireland. What a joy it was to hear them talk among themselves with their clear lilting Irish accents. And more a fun-loving crowd you could never imagine. Good companions for the day. Felt like a real St. Paddy’s Day!
Monday was a rainy one in the city, which was a bit unusual for the area. Judy did a bit of shopping while Chuck and I took a hike down Las Vegas Boulevard, hopping in and out of casinos and shops to stay dry until we reached the M & M store – one of our favorite places. We bought some of the famous candies and made our way back to the front door of the store. It was still raining pretty hard. Chuck saw a bus stop in front of us and said he was going to check something out. He walked out and hopped on the bus! I was a bit startled by his action but I hurried up and joined him.
Please note that we had no tickets.
We both looked at the machine on the bus that dispensed the tickets. We started reading the lengthy sign that described how to buy tickets with cash or credit card. Did I mention that it was a lengthy sign? The bus started moving. We then heard a man next to us say, “there’s no checker on this bus. I wouldn’t buy a ticket if I were you.” So we stood and watched the city go by until we reached the next stop, which was ours, and then got off. What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, right? But now you know. Two desperate men, trying to stay dry.
On our last night in town the three of us rode one the city’s double-decker busses, called Deuces, uptown to Fremont Street, the old Las Vegas downtown. “Glitter Gulch”. This is old Vegas and always seems a bit more open and wilder than the Strip. Lots more street entertainers of every ilk, the overhead canopy with its hourly light and music show and the casinos along here all seemed busier, louder and brighter. They still serve free cocktails to the slot players there as we can all attest and the games all seemed loser and more congenial. We had our pictures taken in front of a million dollars cash at the Horseshoe and then had a tasty prime rib dinner at the 3 Queens for a MUCH cheaper price than anything on the Strip.
The three of us made a pact that the next trip to the city would be based in a downtown hotel.
The next day it was off to McCarran Airport via Uber again and our flights home. And, as usual, the last sounds we heard from the city of Las Vegas were the ding-ding-dings of the slot machines on the concourses vacuuming up the last of the tourist dollars.
Some various Vegas thoughts:
I never did memorize the route to our hotel room after we got off the elevator on our floor at Bally’s. It was first a right turn then another right turn then a left. I always missed one of the turns. Judy and Chuck laughed at me a lot. And I was sober at least most of the time.
We ate noodle dishes for supper one night at the Paris Hotel at a noodle-dim sum-dumpling place. Chuck said the food was very similar to what he had eaten in Southeast Asia, which he raved about. Very tasty soup but way too much in the bowl for me. Chuck ate his and half of mine.
Listening to a gaggle of women party away on the top level of a double-decker bus as night fell on the city and our magic carpet motored north. Maybe they were locals dressed up for a night on the town. Maybe they were from Dubuque or Amarillo or St. Louis kicking up their heels on a girl’s weekend out. Or maybe just working girls heading out for the night after nipping the bottle a time or two.
I think the act of people watching might have been the most enjoyable of pastimes there. Between the tourists, the entertainers, the locals scurrying from and to their jobs, the drunken college kids, the outlandishly dressed folks whooping it up and the “working” girls it was a fever dream colorfully come to life. I do believe I could have sat in a lawn chair and watched the river of people pass me by and been wholly satisfied with my trip.
Las Vegas is, in reality, more a state of mind than just a city. The backdrops of the gigantic hotels, the casinos everywhere and the bustle of the throngs of humanity might only serve as stage settings for the never-ending story of Vegas which is performed daily up and down the strip and nightly on Fremont Street. You will not get the hum and buzz and flash and vibe of this place anywhere else in the world - the exuberance, the emotional highs and physical thrills of this one-of-a-kind American city. The possibilities are endless and dreams can and do come true here.
Roll the dice, turn the card or pull the handle on the slot. Riches wait just around the corner.
Pipes and Anniversaries
I was out of work on this date 15 years ago. I had spent almost twenty years working for a giant telecommunications company and had been “let go” just a short time earlier. The company was in a turbulent period due to mergers, acquisitions and other corporate shenanigans and I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time with not enough “friends in high places” I guess.
I was marched out in early July, six months short of my twentieth anniversary, the naïve faithful employee no longer needed, and was diligently pursuing acquiring another position. In English, gentle reader, that’s known as looking for a new job.
That day, my wife and I were on our way north on I-77 here in Ohio, me heading for an appointment with a “head hunter” in an eastern Cleveland suburb, my wife on a week’s-long vacation just riding along to keep me company. The car radio was on a Cleveland station and we were listening to the Howard Stern program. Howard was broadcasting from New York at that time. I was only halfway listening to the program, concentrating more on the highway and the upcoming appointment, so I guess I missed his first mention of some sort of plane crashing into the World Trade Center. But as Howard blithered on about this event, some part of my thought processes clicked and my attention shifted to the radio and I started listening more intently. At first I though it was one of Howard’s humorous “bits”. He was legendary for doing some outrageous stuff, and this kinda sounded like one of them. He kept going on and on about the plane and how this was no accident and how we were now at war and other observations about the event. I was listening more intently then when he reported that the second plane had hit and I realized that this wasn’t a bit. This was real, and terrible things were happening just a few hundred miles to our east. I flipped through the radio dial at that time and soon verified the terrible story was true.
We soon arrived at the suburban office where my interview was to take place. My wife stayed in our car listening to the radio and I entered the building. Most of the employees of this particular headhunter were gathered around a television in the lobby watching the events of that day unfold. The details of what was happening were still a bit sketchy at that time, but the visuals on the television were appalling. One lady broke away from the group, wiping her tears, to find out what I wanted and, after I told her about my appointment, she let me to another room and gathered my information. She was a nice lady and I’m sure that the company tried to find me a new job in the weeks to follow, but right then her heart and mind really weren’t in synch with my quest for employment. She wanted to be back in front of the TV with her fellow employees. We parted cordially, she returning to the group around the television and I back to my car.
My wife mentioned on the drive home that she had seen an airplane acting strangely while I was in the building, making a quite odd-looking U-turn in the sky and changing from a westerly course to one back east. We later learned that this was probably the airliner which not long after crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
We spent a lot of time in front of the television that day and a lot of the days to follow, watching history unfold in front of us.
And now that day is 15 years in the past.
The TV shows that are being broadcast today commemorating the event make it seem like it only happened yesterday. Watching the towers get hit again and falling still crushes you like a blow to the gut. Watching the horror of the day and how the first responders did their utmost to save lives still brings tears to the eyes and a lump in the throat. It was a tough time.
Perhaps it’s not fitting that I follow up the previous thoughts with what follows, but the sadness of this anniversary is, at least for me, somewhat mitigated by a good thing that happened today.
I got my bathtub back!
Let me retrace a few steps and explain.
I live in an old house. Over a hundred years old actually, and the ownership of an old building like this one always comes with problems. It seems like there’s almost always something else that needs to be done to make our home more livable. I made a checklist some time ago and started working my way through it as time and money became available. What did I do you might ask? How about insulate the walls and attic – check. Install new windows and doors – yep. Put in a new furnace and water heater – yep. Then how about repairing the slate roof and old chimney– check. And on and on. So the next item on our list was the water system. We were still living with the century-old galvanized pipes laid down when the house was built. Perhaps that was during the McKinley presidency? Or perhaps William Howard Taft? Somewhere around that time. Our local water has a noticeable mineral content, so a lot of those solids ended up as deposits on the inside of our pipes. Lots of lime and other minerals. We were at a point where the water flow and pressure at our taps was pitiful and just replacing the fixtures wouldn’t fix the root problem.
So we asked around and finally found a guy who did some outside plumbing. He was a fellow employee from where I used to work before I retired and had a great reputation of being a good plumber and having reasonable rates. I invited him down to our place for a look-see and for him to work up a quote on what it would take. After receiving his more-than-agreeable quote and giving him the go-ahead, he agreed to take on the task of removing all my old piping and replacing it with new CPVC and copper! It took him a few trips to finish the job due to the inevitable this and that you always run into, but the last trip was today! He completed the final hook up in my system this morning and that was to connect the new water supply to a new fixture in the old claw-foot tub in our bathroom. Now it also has a magnificent water flow and super pressure, as do all the other taps in the house.
So another box is checked off on my almost never-ending checklist and another 9/11 anniversary is noted in the world.
So let me conclude today’s blog with this thought.
Let us never forget 9/11/01 and what happened that dreadful day, but let us also remember that there WERE good things that happened then also – babies were born, people were married, trains arrived on time. Good meals were cooked and eaten, children went back to school and good deeds were done. Heroes ran into burning buildings too.
Ordinary people did good things that day, both mighty and mundane.
And fifteen years later a fellow got his pipes fixed on that anniversary and was thankful.
Six Months In
My wife and I were out eating breakfast today when the restaurant owner stopped by our table and asked how I was doing. For a second I drew a blank as to what he was talking about, then it occurred to me what he was actually asking. I had told him about my heart attack and bypass surgery a few months ago and I guess he was just following up. He’s a good guy and was really concerned. Or else he was just being a wise entrepreneur and putting the human touch on his return customers. Either way, being asked this question is becoming a pretty common situation recently. I don’t really mind, as a lot of people seem to know about my recent illness and are genuinely interested in my well being, but it’s not really something I particularly dwell on too much. Some days actually go by without my thinking about it much at all. Some days seeing my chest scar in the mirror while I’m shaving or brushing my teeth comes as a bit of a shock to me.
Some days it’s like nothing ever happened at all.
But, of course it did, you know. I did have a heart attack and I did have open-heart surgery. They did cut into my leg and remove vessels that they used to repair my heart. They did stop my heart and lungs for a period of time to make those repairs.
They really, really, really did do all that stuff. It was not a bad dream that melted away in the morning sunshine.
I guess I’ll never actually forget, much as I might like to.
So the question still remains. How am I?
How I usually answer that question is by saying I’m probably better than I was 6 and a half months ago. Of course that also probably goes without saying. Better blood flow to the heart equals better health all around, don’t ya know. My stamina is better than before. My thinking is probably clearer also. I can physically do things now that maybe I couldn’t before and surely couldn’t do three months ago. I walk every day and my wife and I are taking SilverSneakers classes at a local gym three times a week. Plus all the normal grass cutting, weed whacking, house cleaning and other normal physical activities that need be done when you’re a homeowner.
And for being able to accomplish those things I am truly grateful.
I am still a bit numb in my lower left leg and on my chest where the doctors removed and rerouted veins and arteries to do their repair work and that’s probably the main residual you could point to from the surgery right this minute. My taste buds are also a bit “iffy” – some meals taste fine and others definitely don’t and there’s an unpleasant lingering aftertaste that seems to be new and might be an artifact of my illness. I’ll have to explore that issue in more detail with my cardiologist.
And, of course, my old nemesis, my stomach issues never really went away. They are still as active as ever and might even be indicative of full-blown IBS. My family doctor and I are due to discuss this possibility soon. Fixing the heart did not fix the stomach problems. Dammit!
My family and I went on a road trip last month and I was happy to discover that I could handle being on the road and coping with all the stuff that came up like I did before. I used this trip as a bit of a trial balloon as to my capabilities now and was relieved to see I was pretty much same-o, same-o.
Hurray for that!
I’m still a fan nowadays of an hour or so nap in the afternoon if there’s nothing much going on. I don’t need it, mind you, but it is quite enjoyable. I feel a bit guilty about it, too, but my cardiologist says it’s fine and not to worry, so I’m not fretting much about it. I’m guessing an afternoon nap for folks my age might actually not be an odd occurrence, heart attack or not.
So, gentle reader, there it is in a nutshell. How am I doing?
Pretty darn good! Considering…
Off to the Black Hills
So are you ready for another one of my road trip blogs? I’m sure a lot of folks are more than likely groaning now and saying, “There he goes again. Another road trip described in excruciating detail. Ugh!”
If I just described your feelings my friend, please feel free to preserve your sanity and bid me adieu. I’ll not be offended. Different strokes and all that stuff. I’ll meet ya on the other side with maybe something that’ll shiver your timbers. Bye now…
So, are we all alone? Just the half-dozen of my buds who are brave enough to plod onward through the upcoming purple prose? If so, then lets get going!
I’ve tried recently to plan our road trips to see new things. Sure, going to Myrtle Beach or Gettysburg or Niagara Falls is nice, but we’ve been there multiple times. I can show you the tee shirts! So this time I decided to head northwest and picked South Dakota as our destination. Why there? Well, there are a number of attractions near there that we’ve never seen. I’m not exactly sure why. I’m sure lots of you have already seen these places, either as a kid or maybe as an adult.
But we never have. So I guess that’s reason enough, eh?
My son Tony’s last workday for the week was Monday, so we ventured out on a Tuesday morning. As a long drive was expected, we left before seven am. After a quick stop at our new local Dunkin’s Doughnut shop we headed off in generally the correct direction munching on sweet treats and sipping good hot coffee. The miles passed by under our wheels while we spent most of the day chatting, paying tolls and enjoying (???) the scenery along America’s interstates, especially I-90 which we would see a LOT of. Going through Chicago was, as usual, not entirely a picnic, but the traffic did keep moving and we soon left the skyline of the Windy City disappearing in our rear window. Lunch was at a truck stop north of there and not half bad. Eventually we reached our first stop of the journey at La Crosse, Wisconsin, directly on the Mississippi River. Supper was at a nearby family restaurant and it is best not dwelled upon. The beds felt good, however, after a long day on the road and we all slept well.
Wednesday we were again on the road a little after 7 am after a decent enough hotel breakfast. We jumped on our friend I-90 and would be on it the entire day. Lots of cornfields that day across all of southern Minnesota and some of eastern South Dakota. We stopped for lunch just across the South Dakota line at a restaurant/bar/casino place. Another meh meal, at least for me. Tony seemed to be enjoying all the road food. Good for him! Casinos seemed to be as prevalent as the corn was in the east and cattle were in the west part of the state. Obviously the laws there are a little different than good ol’ Ohio. Stopped at the absolutely obligatory Wall Drug in Wall, SD. Huge store with apparently anything you might want to buy and lots that you ended up looking at and saying, “Huh?” We grabbed some fudge (shame on us) and a refrigerator magnet and were off for our last hour on the road. Our home for the next four days was a hotel right off I-90 in Rapid City, South Dakota, the entrance to the Black Hills. It ended up being a good place.
The landscape from about the middle of South Dakota, actually just after you cross the Missouri River, changes from corn land with some trees to the beginnings of the Great Plains. Rolling land and mile upon mile of grass swaying in the ever-present wind. The prevalence of the wind was demonstrated by the many windmills we saw turning their 3-bladed fans and all facing west. Lots of electricity being produced there. If you looked closely you could see a tree or two here and there, but for the most part it was waving grasslands, windmills and the occasional cattle herd.
Supper was at a TGI Fridays next door to the hotel. They screwed up my order for a ½ rack of ribs and delivered a full rack. They were only going to charge me for the ½ one, but somehow they charged me zero instead. So my dinner was free. It was a nice introduction to our time in western South Dakota.
Thursday was our first “monument” day. After a dandy hot hotel breakfast we drove to Mt. Rushmore. It’s about a 25-mile trip and it goes through the nearby Black Hills. They’re quite pretty and very different than the surrounding plains, with steep-sided hills and lots of evergreens growing everywhere. Mt. Rushmore was very impressive, as I knew it would be. And of course it looks exactly like the thousands of pictures of it you’ve seen all your life. But somehow it’s much more impressive in real life. We ogled the four presidents for a while then Tony and I decided to take the trail down to the monument itself. It was a nice walk there and the view of the carvings was incredible closer up. We continued on the trail down, down and down to the sculpture’s studio in the valley where we checked out the working sculpture in miniature and other artifacts pertaining to carving the faces. Then it was up, up and up to the viewing area where we had started. You can be assured I was huffing and puffing when finally got back up there. Even Tony was winded! We bought souvenirs (of course) then drove further into the Black Hills to see the Crazy Horse Monument. The visitor’s center is quite a ways from the monument, so we took a number of telephoto shots of it from there. Basically, all that has been carved is Crazy Horse’s head. They’re working on his outstretched arm and hand right now. I’m guessing it’ll be another easy hundred years before it’s finished. You could pay for a bus ride closer and pay again for a trip up on his arm, but we chose not to. The visitor’s center had a lot of things to see relating to the native Americans of the area and a good souvenir shop. We lunched there and the meal was actually pretty good. And the view out the window toward the monument was, well, monumental!
Supper was at a family place down the road from our hotel and was fine. In that stretch of about a half-a-mile there were about six or seven casinos – little ones in about every strip mall. LOTS of places to spend a buck. Can’t imagine how they all stay in business.
Friday was our “road trip within a road trip” day. We jumped on good ol’ I-90 and headed west. The interstate curves northward in Rapid City and doesn’t head back west again until it clears most of the northern part of the Black Hills. Before long we crossed over the border into Wyoming and exited the interstate on the road that headed toward Devil’s Tower. There was a longish line waiting to get into the National Park that surrounds the Tower, but soon we were through that. My senior National Park pass got us all in free! We were lucky to find a parking place there and soon I was walking up the trail to the Tower. Judy and Tony were disinclined to join me, so I trod up by myself. It was truly beautiful up there among the evergreens and the huge rocks that had fallen from the Tower over the centuries. The path is paved and, after you had climbed up to the rubble area, it’s virtually flat as it circumnavigates the monument. I walked about one third of the way around and enjoyed all the views and watching some folks and their kids scrambling among the big rocks. You are allowed to climb among the fallen rocks all around the monument, but to scale the Tower itself you need a permit. I saw no one attempting the face while I was there, but did see a couple ascending the trail with climbing ropes on their shoulders. I shuddered thinking about the hundreds of feet of vertical face they would soon be climbing.
Mountain climbing is definitely NOT my sport!
We made a stop on our drive from the Tower to watch a band of playful prairie dogs just off the park road, then hit the big souvenir shop just outside the park’s gate for refreshments and keepsakes.
Driving back to Rapid City we detoured again back into the Black Hills and visited Deadwood. Yes, the real Deadwood. I recalled fondly the HBO show with the same name and other things about the town such as this was where Wild Bill Hickock was dealt his “Aces and Eights” in the No. 10 saloon and was then shot in the back. There are lots of Western stories about Deadwood – it’s a real Wild West town. We stopped at a bar/casino/restaurant for lunch there at a spot across the street from the old No. 10 bar. A brief rain shower wetted down the streets while we ate and a singer entertained us and told jokes. After eating we walked a bit around the town. I was disappointed that all I mostly saw were bars, casinos and souvenir shops. Then I realized that in the 1800’s, discounting the souvenir shops, that is what was mainly there too! Along with the occasional brothel! I made a quick stop in one of the casinos and managed to make $20 in about 30 seconds. The travel gods were smiling on us today.
We drove back to Rapid City via Sturgis, the erstwhile motorcycle capital of the U. S. As the big bike rally wouldn’t be for a number of weeks, it was then just a sleepy town with a preponderance of motorcycle shops and bars.
We didn’t stop.
We drove through some more rain on the way back to the hotel. Back in the plains you can see the storms coming and going a LONG way off!
Saturday was our last day in Rapid City. We drove out to the nearby Ellsworth Air Force Base to look at the South Dakota Air and Space Museum that was located there. It’s a very nice small museum with lots of displays concerning flight and how the state figured in it. While there we took a short tour of a defunct MinuteMan II site. As the site was on the base itself, we had to surrender our driver’s licenses for examination at the gatehouse before being allowed to enter. We were given a very interesting tour of the base before arriving at the missile site. Our guide was quite informative about what we were seeing and we got to go down into the silo and see the missile itself. It was a dummy, of course. All the MinuteMan II sites were emptied and destroyed soon after the S.A.L.T. treaties with the Russians, but this one was preserved as a tourist site. It was a bit chilling reliving some old Cold War memories.
This evening we went to the movies back in Rapid City and saw the new “Ghostbusters” movie. It was very funny and a good counterpoint to the old missile tour earlier in the day.
I won’t go into much of the following six days as we were visiting Judy’s sister and brother-in-law in Tulsa and really didn’t do much noteworthy. Basically family stuff. I will tell you a bit about the following Thursday though. You might find it entertaining.
My brother and sister-in-law are both big fans of country music. Harris, my brother-in-law was born in Montana and pretty much raised in Oklahoma. Country music is undoubtedly in his blood. Anyhow, we were asked months before the trip if we’d be interested in going to a country western concert while we were out there. A group was coming that they really wanted to see. I said fine and they purchased tickets for us. The headliner was Vince Gill and the group was the Time Shifters.
And now, gentle reader, you need to be aware that I’m NOT a big fan of country music. I kinda like bluegrass, however, with all the banjos and fiddles and I hoped the upcoming concert would include at least some of that.
I should have known better.
The venue for the concert was the old Cain’s Ballroom in downtown Tulsa. If you’re from there, you know all about it. If not, Cain’s is a big, barn-like structure, open and cavernous inside. The stage is on one end of the building and the floor is all wooden and, according to my brother-in-law Harris, has springs underneath to make it more enjoyable to dance on. There are huge pictures of about 30 or more old country western singers hanging on the walls.
I recognized a few. Make that two. Gene Autry and Roy Rogers.
There were not any seats other than folding chairs pulled up to folding tables. Oh and maybe some small bleachers along the wall.
There were LOTS of cowboy hats and cowboy boots, snap-fronted shirts and jeans. There were hundreds of folks attending and it seemed that Harris and Lori knew most of them. They were all REALLY looking forward to the show.
When the performers came out onto the stage, a large contingent of the audience left their seats and proceeded to stand in front of the stage.
Blocking all view.
They remained there the entire show. I think I saw a few cowboy hats bobbing above the crowd, but very little else of the performers.
I couldn’t pick one out of a line-up today.
This group performed a type of country western music called “Western Swing”. I guess everyone else knew that. I didn’t. Not that it would have made much difference. I love my bro and sis-in-law and had promised to join them. But… But…
I guess, that after listening to the group, I have at least discovered the one variety of c/w music I pretty much don’t like the most.
Can you guess what it is?
So, while everyone else was clapping, and dancing, and ya-hooing at the appropriate spots, (I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how they knew when to holler) I was smiling my suffering smile and wishing the hands on my watch would move a bit faster.
Way faster.
The group was, of course, persuaded to do two encore songs. The crowd just loved them.
What can I say. As I said, I love my bro and sis-in-law. And if anyone questions that, I’ll tell them this story. I have PROVED my affection!
So our sojourn in South Dakota and Oklahoma came to an end last Saturday when we returned to hearth and home. And dog of course. Barring only a tiny few occurrences, it was a good trip, a fun excursion for the family and a good couple of weeks away from home.
And I think the infusion of my favorite classic rock music on the way home has healed me of most of the wounds western swing had inflicted.
I hope so…
Three Months In
It was a good morning this morning, perhaps even a great one. The grass in the yard was that perfect shade of verdant green that shows up early in the springtime, holds for a month or so and gradually starts to dull out in early summer. My dog Trixi and I were greeted on our daily walk by creamy white flower blossoms strewn all over our yard from the blooming dogwood next door. I’m sure the dog paid no attention to them, but I thought it was a grand touch, icing on the cake of a springtime morning as it were. The breeze was refreshing and the sky was a pellucid blue with those white puffballs of clouds decorating the atmosphere. I know they’re called fair weather cumulus, but puffballs will suffice. These observations occurred during my daily dog walk with Trixi and she was obviously enjoying herself, sniffing at interesting smells about every twenty feet, darting here and there on the end of her leash and generally acting glad to be alive. Dogs are like that. They live in the moment and think little about yesterday or tomorrow if at all.
She was enjoying the perfect spring day and so was her master.
For those inclined to check the calendar and to count days, today marks the third month anniversary of my open-heart surgery back in February. How am I doing? Actually pretty good. I’m out every day walking the dog as you might have gathered from the first part of this blog, about three quarters of a mile. I go to my cardiac rehabilitation three days a week, Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and huff and puff on the exercise machines. I’m active around the house, am able to walk around the stores while shopping and am very close to being almost as fit as I was before I got sick. There is still a bit of soreness in my left leg where they stripped veins, I still haven’t totally regained my stamina and I still enjoy an hour or so with my eyes closed in the afternoon to “recharge” the batteries. My mood is usually happy although I can be a bit snappy from time to time. Some say that comes from the surgical anesthesia and will gradually fade.
It could be a lot worse.
I’ve talked to friends and relatives who have gone through the same sort of procedures that I have gone through and got a lot of feedback. Most of it has been quite positive. Most have talked about actually feeling better than they had previous to their illness. Most say their heart attacks, surgeries and recoveries have allowed them be much more appreciative of life than they were before, more able to see how wonderful it actually is. I like to believe that’s where I’m heading and I think I’ve got a good shot at it. A few folks I chatted with were not so fortunate and have never recovered back to their previous health, but they might have had much more damage to their heart than I did.
I was lucky.
I’ve already talked about how thankful I was for all the good wishes from friends and relatives and the technical expertise of all the medical staff that took care of me in a previous blog, so I won’t go into that again. But being able to walk around on a marvelous day like today, watching the dog frolic on the end of her leash, pain-free and able to dig the world around me just underscores how fortunate I am.
A bit of news that might be of interest: I’ve been asked to participate in a clinical trial of a drug. I fit the patient profile the study was looking for by being a diabetic, having suffered a heart attack and gone through bypass surgery. The drug they’re studying has been used for many years as a pain medication for rheumatoid arthritis patients. Doctors have noticed a marked lessening of cardiac and vascular problems of those patients taking this medication as compared to the general population and are trying to determine if it was the drug or some other factor as the causative agent. I’m in the pre-acceptance phase right now, having my blood checked for anything that might disqualify me and soon they’ll test me to make sure I can tolerate the drug. Then, if all goes well, I’ll be issued the study pills and they will either be the medication or a placebo. I’ll be checked frequently and my results will be added to the many other patients in the study to derive some more definitive answers. Should be interesting.
It might even help me!
As I mentioned before, my cardiac rehab is going well. I have finished visit 19 or 20 already and am well on my way to the goal of 36 visits. The staff at the hospital where the rehab occurs takes very good care of us while we are there, monitoring our heart rhythms closely as we exercise along with our blood pressure (checked three times) and blood sugar (checked twice). They want us to exert ourselves but not to exhaustion, so they constantly check how hard we are working on each machine we exercise on and back us off if it gets too strenuous. Each visit starts with a thirty-minute lecture on various aspects of heart diseases, heart physiology, diet, smoking, medications and everything possible you could imagine about your heart. It is quite the education. Hopefully I’ll be more of an “expert” in my condition after these visits.
I guess the main takeaway from the previous three months and something to ponder on the ¼ year anniversary of my surgery is the fact that “life goes on”. After the drama and hullabaloo of the illness and the pain and uproar of the recovery, things eventually go back to just about where they were before. The trash still goes out on Tuesday nights, friends still drop by occasionally, you still get crank telephone calls, day follows day and all the old aches and pains you used to have you still have. With maybe a couple more to enjoy. But most stuff is same, same.
And… maybe… that’s the best news of all.
Thankful
To be honest, I guess I shouldn’t even be here. I mean, the signs were there, you know. Some if not all the tell-tales were evident, especially in hindsight. Let’s look at a few of the billboards along the highway toward my latest misfortune, shall we?
First off, my whole family has had a history of heart trouble. That’s apparent from the records. My father had quintuple bypass surgery back in the ’80. That’s ALL the cardiac arteries. My mother passed away from a heart attack at age 52 – two months after I married my wife. My next-youngest brother passed from a heart attack at age 42. My youngest brother has had a heart attack, several stents implanted and wears a pace maker/defillibrater in his chest to this day. And let’s not forget the various cousins, aunts and uncles, etc.
Lots and lots of ticker troubles. And, of course I knew all about that. And of course every time I had any discomfort at all in my chest region I went running to get it checked out.
And the results, until recently of course, were always, “no trouble found.”
I’m in my late ‘60’s now and was beginning to think that maybe I had escaped the brutal family genetics, maybe my heart had skipped a generation insofar as it’s predisposed genetic propensity to “get sick”. I used to feel maybe a bit lucky in this regard.
A bit fortunate?
But that once-in-a-lifetime lottery draw was not to be my fate this time around the karmic wheel.
Maybe it actually started a couple months ago with some stomach troubles. I’d gone to my doctor with some gastric complaints, pains here and there in the mid-chest/gut region and had been subjected to a series of stomach tests – upper G.I., ultrasound of my gall bladder and pancreas and an endoscopy of my ensophogeus and stomach. Nothing of any import was discovered. Just an old man with some on-again, off-again stomach issues.
I’d had them before.
Then on Wednesday, February 17 while exercising at our local gym along with my wife I began to experience middle-of-the-chest pains that increased the harder I worked. My wife, after hearing of my discomfort asked if I wanted her to drive us when we left. I said no and still felt bad by the time we got to the car. After a lunch my pain had subsided and I again thought – stomach?
Now by this time you and I BOTH know that it wasn’t stomach pain. Sure it wasn’t classical heart attack – no radiating pain up the neck or jawline or down the left arm. No particular sweats or terrors.
But…
But…
I should have been smarter. My wife should have been just THAT much more insistent on Wednesday that I do something about the discomfort.
Anything, actually.
I was heading helter skelter toward being one of those dumb statistics you see all around you. Right age, right lifestyle, right history, ignored the most BLATANT symptoms. Blah, blah, blah – idiot, idiot, idiot.
So my former life went on for another day-and-a-half.
The big-top went up for real on Friday morning, February 19 about 6:45. I woke up to quite heavy pains again dead center in my chest. A quick trip to the bathroom scored no improvement in the symptom and my wife asked in a worried tone of voice from her side of the bed whether I might want to call the emergency squad. She had finally figured out the magic equation of 1 + 1 and had, at last, arrived at the correct answer of 2. So I agreed and quickly dialed the 9-1-1.
Seeing as how we live only about two blocks from the main firehouse here in town, my rescue squad arrived in about five minutes. They assisted me to the vehicle and quickly I was hooked up to a heart monitor and heading up the street to the hospital about a mile and a half up the road.
The squad pulled in to the hospital’s emergency entrance and efficiently extracted me from the ambulance and wheeled me into the ER. Soon I was having test equipment poked and prodded onto me, into me and many, many questions were asked. By that time it was about 7:30 and my chest pain was GONE! I wasn’t sure if that was something that happened from time to time during heart attacks, but it sure did happen that time. My ER doctor was sure in his mind that what I had just suffered WAS a heart attack and immediately started an enzyme study. When a person has a heart attack, certain enzymes are released into his blood stream. The discovery of these chemicals is the present gold standard on whether the individual has truly had a heart attack.
They test your blood a number of times for these chemicals. And, of course, mine didn’t show any telltales the first time around.
However, it was there the second time and for all the following tests.
I was a “for-sure” heart attack victim.
Good grief, Charlie Brown!
I was admitted to the hospital later that day. The docs wanted to take a look at the condition of my heart vessels, but the cath lab doesn’t do “routine” heart catherizations on weekends.
Lucky me, I would have to wait a bit.
I was scheduled for the test on Monday morning. In the meantime my local hospital performed many other tests on me to clarify the picture for any physicians wanting more information, x-rays, ultrasounds and many, many blood tests for this and that.
Monday morning I was wheeled down to the cath lab and experienced one of those weird dejavu circumstances. One of the cath assistants, good-looking fellow about mid-30’s came up to me and introduced himself. I took a gander at him. He looked AWFULLY familiar. I asked him if he had a brother who worked in the hospital’s fitness facility. He responded, “Yes, a twin.” I had just that week finished a series of physical therapy sessions with that guy’s brother!
They were identical.
The cath itself went pretty uneventfully and before long the doctor was explaining that there were three arteries mainly blocked and I was going to be transferred to Canton Aultman Hospital in preparation for coronary bypass surgery.
I guess my mind was sort of numb by then. It was a whole lot to take in. I just nodded.
The trip to Canton was pretty uneventful. A Wooster nurse accompanied us as I still had the cath sleeve stuck in my femoral artery in my groin where the cath had been inserted and she was in charge of that piece of apparatus. I think they were contemplating stents even then, but the inserted piece was removed soon after arriving at the new hospital.
Apparently surgery it was to be.
I was scheduled for midday on Monday for my operation. A good friend of ours accompanied my wife to the hospital to share the long waiting hours with her and I was immensely grateful for that.
My bed was wheeled down to the prep room a little before go-time and the “vein” lady began checking my legs. They would use some of my veins from there for the bypass and she wanted an early peek as to where the “good” ones were. Soon she was satisfied she’d selected the best ones for harvest and had my left leg all marked up with cryptic magic marker symbols.
I was then wheeled into the operating room. They had promised me some sedatives about then to calm me down, but they weren’t, as far as I was concerned, as quick with the needle as I had hoped. I was helped onto a steel table and they started to strap me down. Apparently I was babbling about how I didn’t want to see ANYTHING in that room and to please give me the “happy juice”, etc. The doctors and nurses all were chuckling at my discomfiture, patting me and assuring me that all would be well. Obviously it was another “day at the office” for them.
I guess you had to be there.
About that time I bid adios to the conscious world and knew no more for a time.
I found out a bit later after waking up that an emergency case had come in and it had taken precedence over me. I had been shunted a bit aside and kept asleep until the emergency was handled. Then my procedure was done. So my time asleep was about twice what they’d originally figured on. My wife and her friend were there until almost midnight.
A terribly long day for them just waiting.
I was later told that the doctors assumed I’d sleep until early afternoon after the surgery. That’s what happens when you assume stuff. I awoke at 4:30, less than 5 hours after completion. I guess I was tired being knocked out.
A lot of things happened the next few days. Some I kinda remember, some I’ve had recounted to me. People came, people left. Tests were performed on me and results gathered. Time passed for me in the hospital and, I assume, for the rest of the world not so tied up in the minutia of the healing of one old man in northeast Ohio.
Tuesday I got morphine. I guess I was in some pretty severe pain and the docs told my wife they were “allowed” to use it once. She smiled as she recounted my words after getting the blessed shot. “I think I’m going to sleep now. Good night!” And I got the MOST restful four hours of sleep maybe in my life.
Things started looking up from that point.
I found, during my time in the hospital after the operation, that I was having difficulties speaking, in expressing the thoughts I was having. I could see the whole concept I wanted to say – it was floating out there like a thought bubble in a cartoon – but when I went to grab it with my proverbial butterfly net, most times it shattered and what came out of my mouth sounded like gibberish. I have always assumed myself to be halfway articulate, and this was intellectually painful. I asked about this malfunction from my doctors later and was told it was called “heart-lung” brain or some such term.
It was a result of the anesthesia. It would go away.
And it has, mostly. I still feel a little “loss for words” from time to time, but never to that degree of bewilderment that I felt most of the first week.
I also found I was using profanity more than I usually do. Inappropriately I’m sure. Forgive me for that. It was also a “glitch” in the firmware.
During the five or so days I inhabited the big hospital in Canton my body began it’s healing. Every day I enjoyed small victories: getting in the recliner next to the bed for some “non-horizontal” healing. Getting the catheter and drain tubes disconnected. Going to the bathroom unassisted. Walking the halls for exercise with my wife by my side. Putting on a pair of pajama bottoms and rejoicing at once again having pants on!
And during those days I also rejoiced at my guests. My loving circle of family and friends. The conversations and quiet laughter we shared, the smiles and pats on the shoulder, the words of encouragement. Not to mention the strong words of prayer given by my sister and brother-in-law which bolstered my now rapidly healing heart and which undoubtedly did much to encourage my healing body and peaceful mind.
I also received numerous phone calls from friends and loved ones that could not be there in person, which also raised my spirits and encouraged my healing. It was always a joy to hear my room phone or my cell jingle during those long days.
On Friday it was hinted that I might go home the following day. It seems I was knitting together sufficiently well to be released back into the wild to continue the healing. So on Saturday afternoon I was wheeled through this big hospital, which I had never actually seen, to the huge revolving front door and out into the back seat of our car.
I won’t go into much detail now as to the post-hospital part of this story. Suffice it to say my wife and I were invited and accepted an invitation to stay at a friend’s house for as long as we would like. They were snow-birding it in Arizona and their house was empty. The idea was that this house was a one-story and I wouldn’t have to climb the stairs that I would have to at my own home. We enjoyed their hospitality for a week after which I grew too homesick for my own “stuff”, my own environment, and we at last moved back home.
I could go on and on now about how life is both the same yet utterly changed after moving home. How our dog that was reported to have missed me terribly suddenly recovered her equanimity after my return and caught up on her naps by my side. How the pain in my chest was less every day and my stamina increased commensurately.
And now I’m faced with the dilemma on how to thank all of you. How do I say thanks to everyone involved in literally saving my life? The uniformed guys in the rescue squad, the myriad of supremely talented doctors, nurses and other medical staff? The ambulance drivers, wheelchair pushers, the food guys who brought my meals? Even the guys and gals who cleaned my floor every day and always had a smile and hello to the sick old guy in the bed?
To my son Tony and how by seeing his dad so sick was able to face a lot of his own fears and overcome them. I am pleased and surprised at his accomplishment.
And last but not least, my family and friends who supported me as they were able. By their visits, their flowers and cards, their calls and their many, many cheerful and encouraging comments on social media.
And in a special category by herself, my wife Judy. I am confident that I wouldn’t have made it through this ordeal without her calm support and forever-loving commitment to me and to my ability to overcome this latest obstacle in our lives. I was daily surprised at her abilities to cope with the situation, to say just the right thing to calm my nerves, to comfort me just by being there and to save her darker hours for times when she was out of my sight. I honor her, bless her and know I couldn’t have done nearly as well as she did and continues to do.
So to all of you, mentioned or not mentioned, thank you. Be aware you all helped pull this ol’ guy through his latest little adventure. Please come by some time and say hello. Pick up the phone and do the same if you can.
Know that you all are appreciated and loved.
Thanks again…
