The cold that wasn't

I've been recovering slowly from what feels like a really bad cold, but isn't. I managed to really wreck my throat and lungs last Thursday night, while cleaning out our friend's freezer after it had stopped cooling for several days, while we were watching their house. The smell from all the spoiled food was so bad, it was almost like trying to breathe some evil liquid. Just breathing the air for a few hours during our cleanup effort left me with burning throat and lungs that night, and over the past few days, it's felt a little like having a cold, with headache, coughing, and runny nose. I've got the can't-sleep-while-coughing syndrome in the evenings, so I'm a bit of a walking zombie the past few days. I'd like to say it's getting better, but I'm too close to it, so I can't really tell. I still feel pretty miserable in the mornings, all stuffed up and achy.

Floors Done

The vapors from staining and varnishing the refinished wood floor were pretty toxic, so they shooed us out, and we spent the past week at the Park Meadows Residence Inn. We got to take advantage of their buffet breakfast, and the pool and jacuzzi. Mandy was excited to be exploring new territory around the Inverness area, during our evening and weekend walks. As much as she's a desert dog, she's not all that excited about the current heat wave. It got up to almost 100 degrees today, so we cut our morning walk short, and laid around the nice air conditioned room, until it was time to check out and go home. So, we're back in the house for the moment. Our next big event is repainting the main floor interior, which will evict us again next week. More upheaval to come...

K's been to the Ortho doc pretty regularly lately, and it's mostly good news. The left foot is still off wound watch. The right heel is looking really good. The smaller wound on the bottom of her foot is mostly healed up, and has been removed from wound status. She had a minor setback last week - with the new boot, and all the activity related to getting everything off the wood floors, she'd developed a new blister around the surgery site on the ball of her right foot. The doc replaced the boot with a different one, and the blister appears to be healing up quickly.

Great Visit

We had a really wonderful time with Mikele and family here. Our new basement space seemed very happy to have the kids move in for a week. We were very touched to see how well everyone got along with Mandy. Bob and I had a real blast with the kids, during our visits to Elitch Gardens and Water World. I can't say enough about how helpful everyone was, in getting our things out of the PODS unit, so we could have it removed from our driveway, and placate a few neighbors who were getting antsy about how long it was going to remain. I got Mikele and Bob out for a little hike that we thoroughly enjoyed - up to Devil's Head fire lookout, the day before they left. I was amazed at how Mandy turned out to be a rock climbing maniac.

I think everyone got a big kick out of the more volatile Summer weather here in Colorado. We all gathered out on our new deck, under the nice solid roof, and watched a big system of thunderstorms move by, complete with half inch hail and unbelievably beautiful cumulonimbus cloud shapes and sunset colors.

We were so sad to see everyone go. We went from a seemingly huge household of 8 (counting Mandy!), to our usual 3, in the blink of an eye. Here's a group photo at Denver International Airport, as I'm dropping them off. Thanks to Bob for springing for a really nice dinner at Pour La France in the airport!

So it's back to the everyday grind. There's still work being done on the basement and elsewhere around the house. I'm not convinced that everything will ever be completely done. About the time one thing gets finished, we notice several little things that need to be redone, so sometimes it seems our list is getting longer instead of shorter. The next big thing, is the people coming tomorrow, and for the next two weeks, to refinish the wood floor in the kitchen, after the dishwasher leak back in September damaged it severely. We put off having this work started, until most of the other work around the house was done. We'll need to move out of the house for part of next week, as the fumes from the wood varnish would just about kill us off otherwise.

K's feet are doing surprising well. She's been wearing "diabetic boots" which seem to help reduce the loading on her feet, and give them a chance to heal. The left foot is pretty much off wound status, which is great news. The right foot is looking much better, but still has a serious wound, and needs to be watched carefully. K's "new" MWF 6am dialysis schedule is beginning to wear on us, since we both have a difficult time getting to bed early, but we do like how they give her back the afternoons on those days.

Fun, Fun, Fun!

The HKs are here! Mikele got here on Tuesday a week ago, and attended the performing arts conference in downtown Denver for the week. She rode the light rail downtown and back, which is a pretty fun experience. Then the rest of the HKs arrived very late on the evening of Friday the 13th. Mikele graciously volunteered her entire family to help us move our precious belongings back down into the basement from the living room, dining room, and bedroom. It's amazing to be able to see the floor again in those rooms. And, as a special bonus, they also helped us empty the PODS unit, which was removed from our driveway yesterday. Hooray! What a relief. Thanks to Ken and Freddie, and all the HKs, for their unbelievably helpful contribution to getting that done! Oh, and we're having some fun, too. On Monday, all the boys went disc golfing at Ranch House in Ken Caryl. On Tuesday, Bob and I took all the kids to Elitch Gardens. That's Tyler, Dorothy, and me in the pic, on the XLR8R ride, which was very thrilling! Wednesday was a quiet clothes shopping day at Cherry Creek, for me and Mikele and the kids. Today we're heading out to Water World!

Monday Musings

We had our first relatively quiet weekend at home, in a long time. Nobody came by to work on anything! Oh, there was some excitement. I took Mandy out for her morning outing, and she was sniffing around the rocks at the neighbor's house, and suddenly jumped back, very agitated. I saw a wasp come flying out of the rocks at about the same time. She completely forgot about needing to use the grass, and slunk back into the house, periodically rubbing her nose with her paws. I called the Animal ER, and they were very concerned about the possibility of a bad reaction to a bee sting. They said that many dogs have a strong allergic reaction, especially at this higher altitude. She seemed to perk up after a few minutes, and really wanted to go out again, so I took her for a 20 minute walk down on Lee Gulch, watching for signs of swelling, or a rash, or difficult breathing, but she seemed fine. On the way back, I talked to a neighbor who mentioned a friend's dog was swollen up for weeks after a bee sting. That got me concerned again, so just to be safe, we took her to Animal ER, but after one look at her, and knowing it had been 45 minutes since the event, they recommended taking her home, and just monitoring her for symptoms. She seemed fine the rest of the day. Now I'm wondering if maybe the wasp just buzzed around in her nose, and frightened her, before flying away. Or maybe a wasp sting isn't as bad as a bee sting, or something like that...

We're trying to adjust to our new life with dialysis at 6am. It's always a race. We rarely get her there before the designated time, although we're usually within a few minutes. This morning, we were daydreaming about a day when we'd leave the house early enough, to be able to stop somewhere for a breakfast sandwich. What a concept. She's supposed to eat a few ounces of protein before dialysis, and it's hard to get that done, when we're just rushing to get ready to go, charging up the oxygen bottle, taking the dog out, all that stuff.

We're looking forward to a visit from my sister and most of her family! She's arriving tomorrow afternoon for a performing arts conference, then will be arriving Friday night. I guess her oldest, the newly certified lawyer in the family, will be hunting for work, now that he's got that crucial bar exam behind him.

Dang that foot

K's ortho doc called me (what a great guy) to report he removed the full contact cast on her right foot. This was the first of several weekly scheduled inspection and change appointments. He was very disappointed to find the wound was quite macerated, and she had another large blister on her heel. So we're kind of back to the beginning (pre-holidays), on the long winding path to healed up feet. On the good side, her left heel is looking much better. I hope I don't jinx things by saying it, but it seems like it's mostly healed up.

Just Another Day

We got K to her 6am dialysis almost on time this morning. I took Mandy for a walk down to Lee Gulch, and now I'm just puttering around the house, sweeping up stuff, doing laundry, and waiting for the various worker folks to arrive, to make sure they know what K has in store for them today. I had Mandy in the open garage on a lead, and she started barking at the first person who arrived, so I settled her into the car, and she seems snug as a bug in there for the moment.

Special Treatment

K's ortho doc has been very conscientious, making every effort to give her the opportunity to heal, and even calling me after every one of her visits, to summarize her status and his approach to her care. His latest effort today, was to put K's right leg in a full-contact cast. Here she is at dialysis, with her new day-glow pink accoutrement. He's hoping it will distribute any pressure on the foot more evenly, and give the wound on the bottom a better chance to heal.

Follow up

K had a busy day on Wednesday. House stuff, errands, dialysis, and a follow up appointment with the ortho doc, who said he's going to try something different, to help her feet be able to heal without being totally off them all the time.

Sunday

K's numbers (glucose, temp, pulse/ox) seemed OK this morning. She stayed in bed awhile, recovering from the stressful hospital visit. With her off-the-feet order, dog class on Monday seems pretty much out of the question.

I took Mandy for a walk up Lee Gulch to the pond at Ashbaugh Park, and even tried her off leash for awhile. She was so good most of the time. She really wants to be 50 feet ahead of me, but once she gets out there, she slows down and keeps pace, using the extra distance as a time buffer, so she can sniff around to her heart's content, without falling behind, as I catch up at my slow human-walking pace. When I start running, she lets me catch up, then lopes along next to me, and glances up occasionally with a sort of happy dog look, if you can picture that. Then came the moment when she spotted someone walking a couple of big dogs, off in the distance. She went on her usual alert, ears up, all four legs stiff, and started into her stalking mode. But wonder of wonders, she stopped on command, and waited for me to come up beside her. We had a nice run on leash, the rest of the way home. Here she is, running alongside me, although looking at it now, she's obviously barely putting out any effort to keep up with me.

The painters were here over the weekend, doing the windows and doors. The big room is looking pretty done, aside from the shelves not being trimmed in yet.

K's Home

K came home from St Jo tonight. My estimate was way off. Last night I was thinking that I'd have her out of there by 3pm today, with just dialysis to do in the morning. But with the confusion with the antibiotics, and other general hospital slowdowns, I didn't get her out of there until after 8pm. The antibiotic question was resolved in favor of having DaVita administer them during dialysis, but that's only every other day, so it's a poor compromise at best. She had a 100 degree temp just before checking out, but the tech was creative, and had her drink some water and measure again, which of course brought it down. So now we're watching her temp very carefully, and it does seem to be going down.The last thing they messed up was her prescription for pain meds on the way out. They forgot the pharmacy had closed, and sent the hard copy down in the pneumatic tube, so there was no way to get it back. It took nearly an hour to get everyone to understand what needed to be done, and to get a doc to sign a new prescription, and get it back to us. By that time, we were so tired, we just came home anyway - maybe she'll get it filled at Kaiser. She's on a no-walk no-drive order, and wearing a big unwieldy boot on her right foot, so it will be interesting getting her to the follow up appointment on the morning of the 21st, especially since that's her dialysis day. We'll be asking around to see if someone can take her. The good news is that the DaVita center was willing to slide her dialysis appointment back from 1pm to 5pm that day. Sigh. Another long day. I just got back from walking Mandy one last time before bed, and now it's time to get these tired eyes closed.

In Dialysis

They got K into Dialysis this morning around 8am. It's funny that it took so long, because the dialysis facility is on the same 3rd floor where she's staying, just a few feet from her room. Dr Brook called the house to tell me he changed his mind about allowing her to walk, and will be ordering that she keep all weight off her foot. I know it will be a great inconvenience, but that's really pretty great news to me, since it seems obvious that this latest round of foot problems is all about the trauma caused by walking around on the wounds. K called from Dialysis a little while ago. She says the antibiotic order is problematic. They'll want her on daily IV antibiotics for awhile, so she may need to have a PICC line inserted. The dialysis folks are concerned about losing a possible site. I'm not clear on this, but it sounds like for some reason DaVita won't administer antibiotics, which is forcing the PICC line issue. It sounds like they want to leave the decision to her, but I asked her to get the docs talking so they can resolve it as best as possible for her.

Post Op

K's out of surgery as of 5pm. Dr Brook just called to give me the details. He debrided existing wounds, removed the medial sesmoid bone, and planted antibiotic beads. He also loosened the Achilles tendon to prevent future problems. He's going to confer with an infectious diseases specialist about what antibiotics to use. The problem is complicated by the various antibiotics they've already had her taking recently. He says he'll be sending her home tomorrow after dialysis at the hospital, and wearing a cam boot, which has a rounded bottom to help prevent putting too much pressure on the bottom of the foot. It sounds like she's now in the best possible position, to be able to recover from the current situation. She has a follow up appointment with the doc and his nurse on Wednesday.

Waiting for Surgery

K says they never got around to taking her to dialysis this morning, so they'll either have to delay the surgery, do the dialysis later today after the surgery (doesn't seem likely), or have her do a make up session at the DaVita center on Saturday (not as easy as it sounds to schedule one of these on short notice). I think they should keep her another day, and do it in the hospital tomorrow morning. The cardio doc called the house this morning, to say the result of her nuclear stress test was "normal", which means her heart shouldn't be a factor in U of Chicago deciding whether or not she should go forward with a transplant.

Checked In

Mandy and I drove K up to Exempla St Joseph hospital this (Thursday) evening, to check her in for tomorrow's (OK, technically, today's) planned foot surgery. She's in the South wing on the 3rd floor, in a nice clean single room at the end of the hall, just across from the Solarium. She should be getting dialysis in the morning, and the surgery in the afternoon.

Basement Carpet

The basement made a big jump towards looking done, after the carpet was laid down. In this picture you can see the new carpet, the cabinets installed along the East wall, and the new French doors, which replaced the metal sliding doors we had there before. You can also see the new heater vent down low, which will heat the room more efficiently. We are so excited about how close this space is to being usable!

Nuclear stress test

K went for her nuclear stress test today. At least that's the name they used, when they called to confirm her appointment. Cool name for a fairly long (3-4 hour) test that evaluates blood flow to the heart. This is to collect more data in preparation for a possible future transplant operation some day.

Surgery Date

K was notified today that her foot surgery will be Friday at Exempla St Joseph Hospital. It was supposed to be a "day" surgery, but the person calling to notify her said she needs to check in on Thursday afternoon, and was unable to explain why.

On a positive note

Our homeowners association held the annual spring cleanup and brunch today. The brunch was held at the house just down the hill from ours, so we got to see what our new deck, with its trellis and roof, looks like from below. Everyone seemed to like it.

Things are coming along swimmingly on the inside as well. The baseboard is installed, and the closets are sprouting shelves. The big room is currently full of freshly painted interior doors, left to dry by the trim people. Here's Mandy exploring the "door art".

I took Mandy for a walk down to Sterne Park this afternoon. I just love the sundial by the rose garden across the street. Mandy wasn't all that interested, but I caught a regal looking profile shot of her standing in front of it.

Bone Infection

K heard back from her Ortho doc (Pino) this morning, before she left for dialysis. The MRI was difficult to read, but he and an associate think they understand it now. It looks like there is a localized infection in a small bone that's between the big toe and the rest of the foot, and that bone must be removed to prevent the infection from spreading. So the good news is that right now it looks like a relatively minor surgery. This will require a day surgery, after which she'll wear a special protective boot for her foot. She'll need to be on daily IV antibiotics, which they'll administer in dialysis (if they don't blow it again). The scheduling is problematic - they can't get her in, until sometime next week, and Dr Pino will be out of town then, so another surgeon will have to do the work.

No news (is tough to bear)

K got to the Ortho doc on Wednesday morning, and he didn't have anything to report. The scan images were available online instantly after the MRI was taken, but he wanted the official interpretation of the scan from whoever does that stuff. So we still don't know the status of her foot. The good news is she's been taking antibiotics since her first meeting with him, and there's a reasonable possibility that any infection is being held in check, or (hopefully) being beaten back. The doc said to call by Monday if we haven't heard anything. My stomach is in knots waiting for this info, when I have time to think about it. I suppose the good news is that I rarely have that kind of time these days.

The Univ of Chicago transplant group called today, to let K know that she's been moved to their "inactive list". The KP transplant coordinator had called them to report that K's foot wounds are still not healed.

Got an MRI appt

The Radiology dept called and had found an appointment for K for Tuesday evening. We'll know more after that. She's got a follow-up appointment with the Ortho doc on Wednesday morning. In the meantime, K is extremely worried and depressed about the possibility of serious foot surgery in the near future. I'm not holding up so well myself.

Foot concerns

K's previously recovered heel has reverted to wound status, but it's not as serious as the balls of her feet, which have both been deteriorating. The right one is looking especially bad. The Ortho doc on Friday thought he could touch bone through the wound with a Q tip. He put her on oral antibiotics and ordered an MRI. He wants it done before the follow up appointment on Wednesday, but the MRI dept doesn't have any openings before next Saturday. Typical. There's so much going on in our life right now, that everything seems to blur together, and it's hard to get anything done, especially when the system doesn't cooperate.

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.