Walk

I took Mandy on a little walk up Lee Gulch to the high school and back. A great Blue Heron flew by, throwing a huge shadow over us for a second, then settled gracefully onto the bank of the gulch, and hopped down to pick at grass and minnows in the creek.

Mandy has this thing about just going right up to the top of any steps we pass by. I think she must've once lived with someone who had a house with steps up to the front door. Either that, or her adventurous soul can't resist the opportunity to see what's up there.

The spring blossoms are coming out beautifully about now. They're looking especially good on the plum and crabapple trees in the front yard.

Railing

The decking is all laid down, and now the railing is going up. The vertical supports will have composite material around them to keep the weather out as much as possible. This Trex material looks really good, and feels wonderful to the bare foot. I'm thinking it will be a real pleasure to wander out there bare footed, and not have to worry about splinters!

Decking

Most of the decking material has been laid down. The ends are ragged, but that's just a matter of buzzing them straight with a saw. This time around, we're opting for composite decking, to eliminate splinters, and also to hopefully extend the service life a little longer than last time.

Textured

It hardly took any time for the basement walls to be textured. The pattern looks really nice.

Primed

The basement walls are all primed and ready to be textured. Here's my office. I'll even have a bit of a view of the Rockies, or at least a little of the Front Range, off to the Southwest.

Deck Supports

They're making rapid progress on the deck now. All the demo work is done, and the new underpinnings are in place. For sure it will be treated wood this time around, so maybe it will last a bit longer.

Walk the Platte

Ken and Freddie and I took Mandy on a walk along the South Platte River to Panera Bread for lunch, on this fine sunny Sunday. In the past, Mandy wouldn't want to get anywhere near the water, but these days she's more than happy to not only lap up some water from the shore, but she also is more than happy to wade through ankle deep water at the beach. She took great interest in a group of people hanging from a nearby tree - probably a class on rope climbing.

Ketring Park

I took Mandy for a little walk around Ketring Park and Gallup Reservoir on this very windy Saturday. She loves the big grassy space, and was particularly fascinated by the guys playing Frisbee with their dog across the grass.

Sheetrock's Up!

The drywall's up and taped, so we're pretty far along. I do miss that feeling of spaciousness, when looking through the empty basement, or even peering between all the open framing. Now we're starting to get a sense of what the space is going to feel like. Here's the hallway. I happened to catch Mandy exploring in the dark. I didn't know she was there, until she showed up in the flash picture :o)

Not too late for snow!

We got a few inches of snow last night. All the trees had a fairyland kind of look to them this morning, all delicately coated in thick white stuff.

Launch of AV014!

We successfully launched AV-014, an Atlas V carrying the ICO mobile communications payload, this afternoon. It was one of those "relatively civilized" countdown schedules, where we worked a mostly normal day.

I took advantage of the nice Spring weather to ride my bike after work, down Lee Gulch and Highline Canal, to the bike shop. I missed them by 5 minutes, but it was a nice short fun ride anyway.

Framed and Insulated

The basement is still progressing. In this stitched panorama picture, just about all the framing is done, but you can still see through all the walls, and get a feeling of lots of space down there. I love that. After all the sawing and other construction activities, we have a fine layer of sawdust over almost everything througout the house. You can see the particles still floating in the basement air, reflecting the flash back at the camera as big suspended blobs.

And then... in the blink of an eye.. it's all insulated and ready for the sheet rock! Here's the South wall. It's already beginning to look so cozy and warm and quiet. I miss being able to see all the pipes and wires up there, but I've mostly let go of needing to have access to all that. We are *so* looking forward to using our new living space, when it finally becomes available.

Infiltration

Sher asked about infiltration. I found this description online at globaldialysis.com: Among the most dramatic and troublesome complications of dialysis is access infiltration. In most cases the infiltration is minor and usually results from either inadequate hemostasis at the end of dialysis or needle perforation through the access site [this is what happened to K]. Extravasation injury to the access is more likely when a needle errantly transfixes a graft or vein or when it accidentally becomes dislodged into the subcutaneous tissue. The venous return needle presents the biggest problem. In the face of typical pump speeds of 400 to 500 mL/min a potentially huge volume of fluid can enter the soft tissue before the pump stops in response to the alarm for elevated venous pressure. In many cases, the graft is unusable for weeks after such an episode. Continued use of the access in this setting may result in loss of the access site.

Progress

K's feet continue to heal, but there are still open wounds. She had an infiltration when they started dialyzing her on Friday, so she had to go back at 5am on Saturday morning to try again. She's been seeing someone to help her breathe better, and it seems to be helping. She tested by going off oxygen last night for several hours, and reported that her O2 saturation was bouncing between 85 and 92. Not perfect, but way better than last year. She'll stay on the supplemental oxygen of course, since she should really be above 95 all the time, and we're convinced the higher O2 level is helping her wounds to heal.

The basement work is proceeding. It's amazing to see, even though we had some idea of what to expect, all the people that are coming and going, and the incremental progress being made. The framers had the initial framing done in a couple of days. Then the heating/mechanical guys got in there, and moved a bunch of heating ducts around. The framers came back, and framed the soffits around the ducts. The central vacuum folks added a few more lines. The plumbing folks decided some things were in the wrong place, and jack hammered up some concrete. The electrical folks routed a bunch of Romex around. It's a virtual whirlwind of activity around here.

Mandy's been entirely unsure of the who, what, where, why, and how of the past few weeks, and has decided that barking at every little noise and every new person will help her feel more comfortable with the process. She quiets down immediately, when I pick her up and let her sprawl across my left arm, and sits contentedly watching the activities from that safe haven. She really looks forward to our occasional walks. Here's a picture of her scoping out new territory, on a berm near the Highline Canal where it passes not far from the Littleton Dialysis Center.

My Sister left today after being here for a couple of weeks. It was really nice to have her here. I sure enjoyed her company while going on some nice long walks, doing a few household fixit jobs, taking a short bike ride, running various errands, and of course watching a bunch of movies.