Tuesday, June 26, 2007

The Masked Marauder Strikes again!

My wife and I got up very early yesterday to make a long drive and back to Wyoming. After 14 1/2 hours, we got home and were ready to sleep the sleep of the just. It wasn't to be. At 12:30 am., our three girls came pounding up the stairs from their rooms in the basement, screeching all the way--a sound sure to bring even the dead surging from their beds. They came bursting into our room to the accompaniment of our hurried questions of what was wrong.
"There's a skunk in the window well outside our window!"

Sure enough. On inspection (carefully through the curtains from inside the house), we found one grade A, bonified, live skunk desperately looking for a way out of our 4 1/2 foot deep window well. Needless to say, as a mountain man of some years and experience, and a man of calm and chiseled visage, I did exactly the right thing.
"Go back to bed. We'll deal with it in the morning."
Of course, none of the girls would sleep downstairs after this, and every door between the window well and upstairs was closed, but come morning, our midnight visitor had escaped. He took along with him pieces of the screen from the window, or maybe he just destroyed it beyond recognition out of spite. It looked like he had dug enough dirt against one side of the well to climb to a point where he could jump out. Luckily he did not feel compelled to also leave a lasting reminder of his visit, so we feel blessed all the way around--we'll deal with the screen.
Take care. Get a good nights sleep, and most of your problems will take care of themselves. :o)
Stick.

Thursday, June 21, 2007

Another First

In trying to relieve my pinched nerve, I have now had another first in my life. I went to a Chiropractor.

After taking my life history (boring--I've heard it before), and asking what I wanted to achieve through the visit (my back and leg to stop hurting), he led me to the most wonderful invention I've seen. He put me on a motorized, heated, massage table that kneeded my back from top to bottom for 15 minutes. He told me on the way in not to snore, but when he came back I told him it wasn't snoring, it was purring!
Once I was fully worked over, he took me to another table, where he began to kneed me all over again, with an occasional thump and bump--lining up my vertabrae to something resembling straight.
Over all, my opionion was--not too bad, however, I don't know if I will go again. Now I might consider making an offer on the massage table...
Take care, sit up straight. Stick.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

And the curses continue...

I woke up at 2:30 am. with my leg hurting and cramping so bad I broke into a cold sweat. I was finally able to limp into the other room, where I sat in a chair untill 6 before I finally slept for a couple of hours. It seems that I have a pinched nerve in my back (Sciatic) and it feels like my left leg is cramping all the time--just on the verge of a charlie horse. I'm treating it, but this is nothing like I've ever felt before. Now I'm really looking for those frogs. I think I'd rather have them than this.
Take Care. Stick.

Monday, June 18, 2007

I just hope to avoid the plague of Flies...

I was looking at my arm the other day, and I had a big sore spot . I kept wondering what I had done to myself. At first thought that I had picked up a sliver in my arm from the construction we have been doing. Then I thought it might be a bug bite. As it turns out I have a boil. I'm not even sure I know what that is, or how you get one, but I guess it can spread. Now I wonder if there is something I need to repent of to avoid the frogs and flies.

Be good. Take care. Stick

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Now I know how they boil a live Frog

Some friends of ours live about an hour away near a little town called Downey. I say they live near there, because they actually live in an even smaller town called Swan Lake, but Downey is the subject of this blog.

Just outside of the town of Downey is a hot spring resort called Downata. (That's Down at a Hot Spring). This is one of our favorite places to go as a family. There are pools, slides, hot tubs, and play areas with water heated naturally by the springs. Unlike many hot springs I have been to, there is no unpleasant sulphur odor associated with this one. The water is very warm, in fact in the tubes for the slides, it is so steamy it is hard to breathe.

By the end of the day, all of us were tired and happy--and unfortunately, even with sunblock, burned to a crisp. Thanks to aloevera gel, we have gotten through most of the sunburn process- pain, blister, peeling, etc., but we still looked like boiled lobsters for the next week, and lepers for a few days after that. I'd still go back again tomorrow (and we might). I just need to find a more waterproof sunblock, or recoat more often :o).

Take care, put on some more sunblock. Stick