Walking at Dove Mountain

Greetings!  We left the condo today for some exercise.  The fatigue is still with us. We went up to Dove Mountain to stroll along the Wild Burro Trail.  There is flat walking to be had, which was the right choice.  It's beautiful out there, but it is far.  We need to get stronger so we can do the butt kicking hikes that are close to the condo.

We went up the stairs for about three minutes and decided that was a terrible idea. 

Going back to the house we could see there is still some snow on the mountains, which is surprising.

We're better.  Yesterday was the last day for the anti-virals.  I had the terrible metallic taste in my mouth from Paxlovid, which is gone, and happy I am about that.  Jim's still full of mucus, I never had that; actually I was never really sick except for the fatigue.  Since I got treated the day after I tested positive, I lucked out, Jim not so much.  The fatigue improves daily, we're making an effort not to over do and get sick again.   Tomorrow I think we'll retest and see what it says.

Because we tested at CVS, we were reported to the AZ Dept of Health.  Jim spoke to them today.  As soon as he made it clear that we're not residents, the lady on the phone completely lost interest.  She said she would notify Spokane, but without an address for Washington, I'm not sure what she was going to accomplish.  I don't plan on calling, there's no point.

If you wonder who eats at Waffle House, it's primarily blue collar workers, shift workers and people who don't have a lot of money.  They do a big business after the bars close.  They never close.  During natural disasters where utilities are out, they sent in "jump teams" with generators, propane and water to get open as quickly as possible.  So, first responders and locals have somewhere to eat.  The number of open Waffle Houses is used by FEMA as an indicator of how restoration efforts are going.  If you google on "who eats at Waffle House" there are many answers.  I didn't know about the jump teams.

That's it!  I have no more to contribute.

The Waffle House Reference

I was not aware of this until recently, but apparently fighting in Waffle Houses in the US has become a thing.  It's hard to tell how frequently it happens, but judging by the search results on youtube, if you type in Waffle House, or if you search on twitter for Waffle House Wendy, it happens.  That's the source of the title for the picture of Mike Rogers being restrained on the House floor that I posted yesterday.  

There was a recent brawl, during which a chair was thrown and the employee, Wendy, caught it with one hand.  So that's where we are as a nation, I guess.  

So, CLICK HERE for footage of the chair catch.  It's pretty impressive.

Good Weather in Tucson

Mellow Greetings Fellow Earthlings.  How are things where you are?  Today was warm and sunny, and so we decided to go test our marriage and assemble our bicycles.  As you no doubt recall from my December rant about how much I do not like the new through axle technology on the bikes, today they confirmed my blind hatred of the tech, and raised it by a exponential factor.  Getting the back wheels on was just horrific.  We could do this back when dinosaurs roamed the earth, I could do it by myself with quick release skewers.  It took both of us to get them lined up in the correct slot, along with 3 pairs of nitrile gloves per wheel.  Eventually we prevailed on the wheels, and discovered that ALL of the brake calipers were dragging on the brake rotors.  We had planned to learn how to fix this ourselves, but the thought of getting those wheels off and on again was more than we could bear.  So we dropped them off at our favorite bike store (at the loading dock) and we'll get them back mid-week.  This is further encouraging us to rent a cargo trailer for the trip home, so bike wheels stay on.  At some point, I'm going to pay a bike shop's hourly rate and get them to teach me how to do all of this so I am not dependent on other people.  Youtube is just not getting it done for me.

So, we came home and had chicken noodle soup.  Mirabile dictu Jim could taste it.  We're pretty excited about this, his sense of smell is also recovering.  I would really like all of the people who are convinced the pandemic is over to lose taste and smell for a week, and then contemplate what the rest of their life could be like - it does happen that neither sense ever comes back.

Here is my new chair.  I spent the entire day in it yesterday.  All of it.

This is how the sick amuse themselves.  Our new oven mitt is keeping Jim's cup of coffee warm.

In the past, I have mocked the idea of buying frozen rice.  However, there is no rice making capability in this condo, so it has come to this.  I will let you know how it goes.

Angus, who now lives in Scotland, put this on his blog yesterday.  It was appropriate.

One of the Manhattanites makes the caustic comment that Anglos-Saxons used to sneer at the Italian parliament with its ever changing governments and interminable procedural votes. It now seems that the Brits and Americans have not only adopted the Italian model but are taking it to new levels of unruliness. 

I would offer up this photo as evidence.

That's it!  That's all I've got.

The Sun is Out in Tucson

The fun-o-meter on vacay is still not all that high, but it is off zero.  The sun is out, the skies are blue, which always helps a person's mood.  Today we took the car in for an over due service.  Oil, tire rotation, and who knows what else.  We had been promised a loaner (Lexus always has loaners) and then were told we'd have to wait.  Nope, either find a car or we'll reschedule.  They found a car.  It's very low slung, I'm having to haul myself up and out of the door.

Then is was off to the furniture rental place.  AirBnBs are sort of known for their crappy furniture.  When we were in Prague we had a giant sofa that was so hard that it hurt after awhile to sit on it.  This furniture is worse.  I'm in the chair, and for some reason they decided to put protruding things on the arms that are very uncomfortable to rest on.  The chair is also butt sprung, so I'm sitting on a large decorative pillows.  The pillows on the table are for our feet to rest on.  The loveseat is less terrible, but the seat pan is too deep, and a large pillow behind the back is required.  So, I've rented a recliner.  All they had for me to test sit were models that operate with a control, and it has the capability to lift a person to their feet.  Apparently if you want a recliner, you must be old and too infirm to haul your butt out of a chair.

Then we were off to Target where we saw this truck parked in front.  The security guards were carrying Glocks (9 mm handgun) and tasers.  Their outfits mimicked those worn by Customs and Border Patrol.  They were wearing body armor.  This does not fill me with confidence, one wonders how much training in de-escalation they have had.

They are the International Protective Services.  Se the red lettering on the back most side window?  It says "armed response unit."  Like this is a good thing!

So.... that was interesting.

Monday night it finally occurred to us that maybe it's not a cold.  This is Jim's test.  I tested negative.  Then we read that if you have excessive snot, or blood in your nose from excessive nose blowing, you'll get a false positive.  Still in denial!

Tuesday morning we went down to CVS for a lab test, which takes 24 to 48 hours.  Jim was rapidly reaching the end of his window for anti-virals. So when we got home we did two more home tests.  Jim's made the red line in seconds, I got a faint pink line after 15 minutes.  The doctor's office we used to go to saw Jim at 1:00 for an outdoor appointment.  They looked at our tests and prescribed antivirals for us both,  even though I had not really been seen.  So that was cool.  Getting them filled was painful, we had a guy running the drive through window who was unaware that the government pays for these drugs and wanted us to pay for them (Paxlovid is $500, Lagevrio is $259).  Jim's was ready, mine was not, so we had to go through the line twice.  When Walgreen's melts down, they do an excellent job of it.

Then when we got home, Jim announced that he'd lost his sense of smell and taste.  This is really bad.  Jim's job is to decide if the milk has gone bad, or if the cold cuts are past their good date.  Now I will have to do these things.  If I lose mine, then we're in real trouble.  Some people's senses come back 3 or 4 weeks after the worst part of the Covid.  Other people take 18 to 24 months to recover, and some never do.  We're hoping for the best case scenario.

How did we get this?  No idea.  After the Christmas Eve day brunch we literally did not leave the house, because I did not want to risk exposure.  Jim started feeling bad late on Thursday night, so it may have come from a neighbor  at brunch, although they all looked good.  Or it could have been aerosols hanging in an elevator, the breakfast areas, who knows.  We were always masked, but no one else was. 

People have quit masking, I don't understand it.  Currently XBB.1.5 is sweeping the nation.  It's even more contagious than the older variants, but it is less likely to kill the host than Delta was.  However, research is telling us that even a mild case of Covid can cause T cell exhaustion, which means your immune system is not what it was, and it's not likely to recover.  Long Covid remains a risk.  If everyone would mask, we'd all be a lot better off.  But - Muh Freedumb!

Finally, we were wearing N95s everywhere we went, we aired out the car before turning it over to the dealer, and so have attempted to mitigate risk for all of the non-maskers. 

In Tucson

We're in Tucson.  As of this writing, satisfaction with the vacay is pegging zero on the fun-o-meter.  Jim is sicker than a dog.  There is cough, snot and now a sore throat.  Thus far I have not come down with it, but I wouldn't let him in the car with me today, he had to stay home.  It's cold, cloudy and windy.  I am so happy I brought my rain jacket with me, it has a hood; we have not yet found the umbrellas in the car.  Tomorrow is supposed to be bad, then the warm up will start.  

Food prices here are interesting.  When we moved to Spokane, I was shocked, I say shocked, at food prices.   In Tucson, Safeway is selling eggs for $10 a dozen.  Basha's has them for $7 or $8.  Apparently there were months that there were no eggs available at all.  I guess eggs are back, but still very expensive.  This is because of having to cull flocks of chickens due to the avian flu outbreak.   Having said that, it seems over all food prices are higher than Spokane.  We're in a wealthy part of Tucson, so I wonder if prices are high because of where we are.  Perhaps we should go back to the south end and shop there.  

The drive from Kingman was kind of awful.   We drove through squalls the likes of which I have never seen.  The ruts in the road on a downgrade (!) were full of water.  We survived, and the rain slacked off when it was time to unload the car.  There was this, however.  This was taken off our deck.

That's it!  That's all I've got.

Tucson, Arizona

 We're in Tucson.  It rained pigs and chickens all day.  At one point the ruts in the highway were full of water.  Anyway, we're exhausted, will post pictures tomorrow.  I got an excellent rainbow off the deck earlier.

Oh yes, and Happy New Year!