Doing our part for economic recovery

On a daily basis, I drive past businesses and wait to see signs of the so called recovery. While sometimes it seems to me as though Michigan is dragging its heels in this respect, there are itty-bitty signs that the times are changing. I often see giant wind turbines going from one place to another along the freeways and they're a sight to behold on a truck. They really are huge--so big, only one part at a time fits on the truck--and they're made in Michigan. While we're used to building cars here, at least the turbines show we're capable of changing a business paradigm. Another new and interesting business around here is the movies. Sara saw Wallace Shawn (you may know him as Vizzini in The Princess Bride) downtown last weekend. My friend Judi was going downtown for dinner two weeks ago when she saw a film crew shooting, Detroit 187, in front of the restaurant she was headed for. She was thrilled to see Michael Imperioli up close and personal. She called me up to tell me Christopher smiled at her.

One industry I see that seems unaffected by our economic doldrums is medicine. The parking lots of medical office buildings, hospitals, clinics and pharmacies seem full. My family is doing our own part of boosting that particular business. In the past month, two of us have had an MRI, one is getting a biventricular pacemaker for what the doctor says really is a heart after all, one is getting elective Lasik eye surgery, without which, he cannot be a secret agent man and one may need a shoulder repaired. Let us not forget the canine amongst us who saw a doctor, too.

I'd much rather promote a different industry. The movies sound good, though I don't ever want to be the subject of one of Detroit 187's episodes.

Here's a trailer to watch. You know, I always loved "Cristoffa" in The Sopranos and even though I'll always think of him as a "made man", I have high hopes for this show.

Bratrayal

I spent a little money this summer on replenishing the contents of my bra supply. Not wanting to be cheap about an article of clothing I spend so much time in, I picked up these torture devices in a bra store. I'm not so certain these bras are any better than my usual Target or TJ Maxx finds.

On Tonday (because while it was Tuesday, it felt like a typical work week Monday), I was doing my best to complete a lengthy start of care without touching anything. I knew there were bedbugs in the home I was in, and I was convinced that if I touched anything, I would be bringing something more than my laptop home with me. If this house, lifted straight off an episode of Hoarders, had only bedbugs as non-human inhabitants, I'd be surprised.

Electing to sit on a plastic chair, and nose to the grind stone, I was plowing through the paperwork as fast as humanly possible, when I became aware of something crawling down my arm. Trying hard not to show distaste, disgust, loss of control or screeching like a little girl who has seen her first mouse, I surreptitiously tried to smack whatever it was until I killed the damned thing.

It was an errant bra strap that had mysteriously come undone.

Ixnay the Edbugsbay

As my driver rounded the bend on I-75, we both saw the thick, billowing smoke coming from somewhere on the east side of Detroit. He said, "big fire there," and all I could think about was the last big fire that left those firefighters so critically injured last month. Big fire, indeed. As we merged onto east bound I-94, we could see the wind driven smoke blowing right above us. When we got off on our exit, the smoke was thick enough to make us cough. At the time, I had no idea we were only a couple of miles from an unbelievable inferno.

There were 85 fires in Detroit last night and while not certain they're arson (high winds and downed power lines in the area), the fire department is intimating some are. This is reminiscent of the fires that made this city famous for the problems around Halloween, and Halloween Eve. Last Friday, an arsonist torched a famous art deco building in Highland Park. A structural landmark that stood for 80 years, it's gone forever now.

Soon there will be nothing left of the east side of Detroit. I bet those bedbugs I saw last night will survive, though.

I'm still itching.

Staycation Day 1

We never go away for Labor Day weekend. There's a lot that one can do around here without leaving a 10 mile radius, and the Ford Arts, Beats & Eats festival is one of them. Knitting is another. I'm glad I chose not to mix the two.

My husband and I went to the festival yesterday afternoon, spending $15 to park a half mile from the event, $3 each to get in and $40 for food tickets, half of which we didn't use. Still, the weather was perfectly cool with a high of around 60 degrees with winds out of the north (thank you, Canada!). The crowds were enormous, the food really good and the music at the different band stands was decent.

Can't figure out why people are standing in line for free flax samples.

I'd never heard of Jessica Hernandez and the Deltas before this week and now I've seen her twice. The first was on a morning news show and I'm enamored with her voice. And look! She looks cute without going all Lady Gaga on the audience. While she has tats, her bits are actually covered. LG was in town last night, too, though her venue was at a concert hall where ticket prices ranged from a low of $75 to the heavens. I really think I got the better end of that deal.

This is the first time we've been to this festival. Prior to this year, it's been held in downtown Pontiac where the festival had a hard time attracting vendors and crowds. This year it's in the town next door to us. It's so close, we could have walked if it weren't for my back. I don't resent the parking fee. It helps the host city recoup its costs for police, sanitation and the like. The admission fee goes to charities.

The festival runs through tomorrow night, and I may go back for the music. The lineup for the rest of the weekend includes War, Clint Black, Macy Gray, Alexander Zonjic & Friends and Kansas, just to name a few. There are different stages sure to appeal to everyone.

Be prepared for the monumental size of the crowds if you decide to go. At times it felt as though we were in a cattle chute.

Oh...sometime last night, my brain clicked in and despite the varying yarns, I was able to read my knitting to see where I'd been and where to go from that point. It's almost a shawl!

Where in the hell was I?

I'll be the first to admit that after the crappiest two working weeks I've had in ages, I may have imbibed a little too much fig vodka beginning at the stroke of midnight last night, but for the life of me, I can't figure out where I left off on this shawl.

Usually, I'll leave myself notes. I know, deep in my little pea sized knitter's brain, that against better judgment, I stopped somewhere in the middle of a 16 row repeat. The notes may have been on the pattern which has mysteriously disappeared. I know they're not in the Macbook sticky notes I usually use, or let me say, there is a mysterious note that says begin row 9, but it doesn't say for what. Duh.

Counting rows isn't as easy as it sounds as there are lingering effects from either the figs, or the vodka sometimes the wrong side has knitted rows and the right side has purled rows and the craziness of all these yarns can't help me.

It's cold here in Detroit. Cold enough to drag out the unfinished wool projects that have hibernated during the summer. Cold enough to make me don wool to go get a haircut. Cold enough to force me up to the yarn store where I got a replacement pattern for this feather and fan shawl.

If I could only count, I'd be hurrying to finish this absolutely gorgeous shawl. I love it. Now that it's cold, I want it now. Yesterday! If it kills me, I'll figure it out.

Maybe the answer will come to me while I sleep tonight--just in case, I should put the shawl under my pillow.

A heart that's larger than life

Or maybe I should have titled this post, if it's not one thing, it's another.

Five years ago, as Mr. Larger Than Life lay panting in an ICU bed down at the Detroit Medical Center, the RN caring for him pulled his chest xray up on the monitor. What I saw was the largest cardiac silhouette I think I've ever seen. It looked 3 times bigger than the normal fist sized heart. Now when you think about the Grinch, whose heart grew three sizes to envelope a love of Christmas and spirit, you'd think MLTL's heart would make him all warm and fuzzy.

Not so, my friends, not so.

The size of his heart seems to enable him to hold that much more hatred that he stores up and then dumps on the people who take care of him...his family.

The size of his heart is directly related to an infection, viral myocarditis, that he encountered 23 years ago. A heart this size doesn't beat correctly. It doesn't perfuse correctly, and it's getting tired of doing its share of the work. Late last week, MLTL wore a 24 hour heart monitor. The doctor's office called today, telling him he needed to see the doctor this morning, and to bring a family member with him. He told the doctor he has no family. When asked if he is sure, he said, "no, I am alone." Now the doctor knows this isn't true as both my husband and son have gone with him on these appointments.

Instead of one of us, he took a friend this morning and afterward, all we heard is that he needs a pacemaker on Tuesday and he doesn't know why. In other words, MLTL's sky is falling.

I called the doctor myself and spoke with his nurse practitioner. MLTL has underlying atrial fibrillation (live long enough and we will all likely have this), but way too much ventricular ectopy and frequent 3 second pauses. Because he is deaf, demented and scared, he misunderstood what's going to happen Tuesday, immediately called his daughter and made her cry and has everyone convinced this is the end of his world. Tuesday's appointment is actually with the cardiologist again, not the surgeon, and he was told to bring family with him. Family he denies having.

When I conveyed my conversation with the doctor's office, my sister in law was shocked he'd have told the doctor he has no family. The friend that he took is someone who has stayed close to him to help alleviate the weight of what he carries in his pocket. I just don't get it, but at this point, I've stopped trying to interpret the motivations behind the things he says and does.

While I may have had a sleep-in planned for next Tuesday, I am now supposed to be accompanying this mean old man to see the doctor. As he hates waiting, it's his idea to book the first available appointment at 8 AM. If you're 83 years old, you have time to wait. I hope he doesn't have a heart attack when he learns we're changing the appointment to a more respectable hour.

In the meantime, MLTL believes the doctor is trying to bilk him out of money--as though the Medicare belongs solely to him--and there is no reason for a pacemaker. In his narcissistic mind, it simply isn't possible that anything untoward could have occurred between one doctor visit to the next. What he's failing to forget in his simplistic equation is that it's this cardiologist that he owes his last quarter century to in the first place. Without him, he'd have likely died from the severity of the infection he had. Perhaps he should show more faith in the man.

Lord, this is going to be a difficult weekend.

Someone has a pity paw

Poor Leo hurt the pad of his 4th toe somehow. He won't put any pressure on it and what looks like an abscess is draining brownish gunk. He was fine when I put him in his crate yesterday evening, but when I walked in the door last night, the first thing he had to show me was his sore paw.

On the good side:

He has adapted to walking, running and stalking Isaac on 3 legs.

He has gotten a few extra cookies for his most excellent demonstration of a pathetically sad dog.

He is still wagging his tail

His nose is cold.

On the bad side:

We are $200 lighter in the pocket from the vet bill. $90 for an xray? Really? And $46 for 10 antibiotic capsules?

It's a good thing I'm wracking up all this overtime after all. I'm practicing my pathetic look.