After several days thinking I lost my wallet, I had a “Moment of Lucidity”!

My first day in the hospital, I gave it to the nurse to give to Security to, well, secure it. I was practically asleep when discharged on Tuesday, forgot the wallet, then couldn’t find it the next morning, Wednesday.

Friday, it registered where it was, but it was too late to do anything about it. Then, Saturday, I had to wait till after dialysis to drive back to Scottsbluff to retrieve it.

Regional West Hospital is big. Security had a lot of places to check, they didn’t find it, and stopped their search till I recalled I’d been in Room 185. A short time later, one of the Security guys brought the missing wallet back to me.

Whew!

Andy’s plan for today. Mine, too.

This is too cute not to share again! Andy can’t help “cute”.

My friends Virginia and Larry of Ohio report they have a mourning dove pair raising a family in their porch hanging flowerpot. I’m excited for them!

Back in the 1980s, when I lived on Mississippi Avenue, we had a pair raise three little families of two chicks over the course of summer. I hope my friends get at least that many,, but, better yet, more than the Thomases got! It is fascinating watching them raise their little families.

They lay two eggs and go from there. At this point (front bird), only one baby’s reported, though the second may well be coming or didn’t make it. The reality is of all birds hatched in a season, as few as 10% make it to be one year old.

Andy would have enjoyed our mourning doves on Mississippi because there was a framed window shelving in the kitchen where he could have watched the mourning doves till nap time, then, without moving, a place to take that important kitty nap!

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Mourning Dove Overview, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology

For those reading this outside the North American range of the mourning dove, please take a little time to read about and listen to the call and flight sound the mourning doves make. It is a familiar bird here, one that portents spring with its soft call, and I think it must be one just about all people here can identify correctly.

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Mourning_Dove/sounds

I’ve entered a new phase.

I guess… 

…Andy has, too!

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I am on oxygen 24/7 now. Getting used to maneuvering with tanks and tubing is a bit tedious, but the happy news is it helps me feel much better than I had felt in recent past. I was on oxygen briefly in 2003-2004. It is possible I will be on it briefly again, depending on how my lungs respond. (I probably will stay on it is my guess.) Andy has been curious about the tubing yet very good about it, too. As long as he doesn’t bite and puncture it, we will be OK!

Yesterday’s kitty boy search for toys to vent his play needs inevitably…

…involved…

…pulling out…

…the sparkly toy! I have to supervise this one really closely because he tries to eat it.

Andy’s pent-up play needs prompted me to let him chose what he wanted to play with this morning.

What will he chose?

I guess his choice of ribbon was kinda expected!

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I was released from hospital yesterday afternoon. When I got home, I was so tired I barely made it into bed without supper. All I had to eat yesterday, then, was a 7 am breakfast, but making or going for food was just too much!

I am cursed to be a talker, someone who doesn’t have the filter that tells me “you are in the hospital to rest and get better”. The day before, I had three conversations on phone from family and friend that last more than an hour. On top of that, most of the dialysis and other medical procedures were done during the day.

One last procedure, a sleep apnea test, spoiled any chance of sleep. I was just feet from the nurses’ station. They talked loudly for four hours, but that was just part of the sleep killers! A long call from a family member who’d had lots of issues I was just learning about was upsetting, though she did have a five years sober report that was especially encouraging once I was able to refocus on that.  

As best I can tell, I got two, two-and-a-half hours of sleep! No wonder to stumbled into bed almost as soon as I got home (4:30ish), no supper, and slept to Andy’s stomach’s dismay, till 6:30 this morning.

There is something to the notion you can’t sleep in the hospital!

Thank you for all you good wishes, prayers and thoughts! Also thank you to my three friends, Judy, Terry, and Linda, who stepped up before I even left the Box Butte General emergency room for the ambulance ride to Regional West Hospital in Scottsbluff. I’ve never had all the hard business – Andy’s care, my phone and charger, a ride home, any bills coming up that could be paid late if a better way of taking car of them couldn’t be arranged – arranged before I even left for the hospital before, and their help and care let me have that relief at least!

“Count your blessings”

I have this on my wall where I see it several times a day. I can tell you – and everyone else – that I do this, especially when I get into a funk. I guarantee when you do it, you start to appreciate how blessed you are! Further, when in the habit, you start to see blessings sometimes hide behind funks and other bad moments. I find I can be in the darkest of moods, yet blessing counting brings me back to a more positive state of mind.

Come on, Andy. Fly season is just about here and you need to sharpen your hunting skills!

Andy chased and batted this toy earlier when I wasn’t documenting it…

Yeah, pretend you are interested!

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Oh! he wanted to watch the news! Of course, he wasn’t playing for me.

Andy hates to be held…!

My very first kitty, Freckles the grey tabby, was a rescue kitty. Though her life was short – she died after an operation to spay her – she was well beloved here.

When I brought her from the shelter, I let her explore her new home for as long as she wished, then I picked her up and put her on my chest. She began to purr a very loud purr from such a tiny kitty! It relaxed me I guess because I fell asleep in the recliner with my kitty on my chest. An hour or so later, I woke up. She was still there, purring!

My only photo of Freckles, taken with a webcam.

I suppose I expected all kitties after that to be “Freckles-esue”, loving to be held, but the second kitty, Louie the ginger tabby, was the last one to like being held.

Louie was a great kitty!

No, when I got the Persian kitty boys, Dougy and Andy, I found out these supposedly friendly Persians didn’t like to be held! Shock of shocks! And both were so “floofy” and huggable, I, of course, craved holding them! 

Here’s that photo of Andy being held again:

Notice how I am holding his hind paws to keep him trapped on my lap. See how his body is twisted as he tries to escape the terrors of being held on my lap and “wuvved”! At some point, I just loosen up my grip and let him “Escape the Unpointy Torture Claws of Entrapment” because, well, he hates to be held!

Let him have some control, my thought is, then he will finally relax and just lie there on my lap. I’ve been trying to get this across to him – and Dougy – in his time. No change.

Andy (foreground) and Dougy.

After being pretty much Andy’s whole life for the time past Dougy’s death and his food, play, health needs, companion with Dougy for the first nine years of their lives, from kittenhood, I hoped a day would come when Andy would relax and enjoy being a lap cat! 

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I still try to hold Andy from time to time because I kneed that from him whether he needs it from me!

The weather report?

Ice hockey?

Drug advertisement? You kidding! No! No! No!

So much for that television stuff!

Touch yer nose, Andrew?!

Yes! Yes! Yes!

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Andy showed some interest in basketball news, but by and large, his interest was in getting a nose and face rub!