Mid-Atlantic Musings - Page 2

From King of Prussia, this was about an hour and a half to three quarter's drive. I drove route# 926 to old Route#1 as I had the time and wanted a scenic ride. The farm land and woods along the drive were beautiful.

On the way home I drove all small Maryland state routes, through meandering miles of beautiful countryside and state parks. There were lots of hikers with snow shoes and ski poles on the trails in Gunpowder Falls state park. The very northern part of Maryland soon turned into Amish Country and I crossed back into Pa south of York. Saw lots of Amish in their carriages and even a number of couples braving that brutal wind in open air buggys.

Then I took more winding roads filled with nice farms and stopped at a hysterical flea market. Eventually I wound my way back to Route #1 to check out what new restaurants might be in the Kennett Area for our spring weekend. I stopped in some nice Antique shops in Kennett, and realized that I should go back when there is more time. There are some new ones, with fairly reasonable prices.

Thank you everyone for all the wonderful support. There certainly are many of us going through similar experiences.
The "good news" is that they didn't find any blockages and his arteries are looking great. The "bad news" is that they didn't find any blockages and his arteries are looking great.
If they had found a problem they could have just fixed it and he would be back on track.
We actually were expecting this result but it needed to be checked. They think the problem is really the Mitral Valve. He had the Aortic Valve replaced 16 years ago. He had rheumatic fever as a child and that effects the valves as you age. At that time the Mitral Valve was good. Replacing the Mitral Valve is a pretty difficult surgery and I don't know that is something that he will or should do. He has a great Heart Specialist that he has had for more than 20 years. During the consult before the heart cath he said that there are several treatments and medicines that they will try before even thinking about Mitral Valve replacement. They have already made some changes in his meds and hopefully one of them will work and he will be back feeling like his old self once again.
I can't Thank you enough for all for your support and sharing of your own stories.

Holly, my mom had Mitral Valve prolapse. They were able to treat it with medicines for about 8 years. She had other heart complications as well. She had 2 Mitral Valve replacement surgeries. The first one was a pig's valve. It lasted about 8 years. Then she caught a virus that attacked and destroyed the porcine valve. The torn edges of the valve were destroying the red blood cells as they went through and she became extremely anemic. She would have had to live on 4 transfusions a week or get another valve replacement. She never was able to get off of the ventilator or dialysis from the second surgery although she lived another two months while experiencing multiple system shut down.

Oh Stormy, That must have been so hard for both of you. {{{hugs}}}
Hopefully the change in meds will do the trick. He just isn't a sit around kind of guy and won't be happy if he isn't good enough to be up and doing a few things around the house.

Yes, It was miserable. Those were dark days.

Poor gal, that must have been so tough. Sounds like you've had more than your fair share of life-changin events, long nights and hospital cafeterias.

Well, it's all behind me now, so I spend a lot of effort trying to cram in things that I missed during those years. The up side to it all is that if my brother hadn't been so ill for so many years, leaving me to take care of his daughters, I wouldn't have them in my life now. Mine is the place they call home, and we have a lot of fun together. They and their friends refer to me as Auntie Cool. They actually plan parties and outings with their friends in NYC when I come to visit. They also like to bring friends home for mini vacations. Not bad eh?

I forgot to say how much fun it was watching all of the kids out on sleighs on many of the hills we passed on the way home on Sunday. Made me wonder if Critter had Joyanna out on her snow disk again.

Pagancat--I'm also feeling (a perverse?) comfort , hearing that others here have been thru the fire and worse. stormyla, that sure must have been a hard time. So you go for it now, you have earned it --Wonderful that your nieces see your fine qualities!
Good luck, Holly

Fantastic that you have your nieces and that they have you, Auntie Cool!

How is it that Groundhog Day came and went and no one here in PA posted a word about It? What a bunch of dead beats we are. I see people talking about him on several other forums!

Holly, we recently went through the same thing with my father-in-law - "good news and bad news". Poor guy is so frustrated that they couldn't find out why he's so short of breath all the time. One of the things that did come out of all the testing was the realization that he hadn't been using his CPAP at all! He was diagnosed with sleep apnea several years ago and shortly after gave up wearing the contraption at night because it was too confining :( Evidently the doctors felt that he wasn't getting enough oxygen and that's why he felt so lightheaded and out of breath early in the morning. He got quite the scolding from Rick! Hoping that the meds will do the trick for your father and he'll soon be feeling like his old self again :)

Stormy, sounds like a wonderful weekend! One of these years I'm going to have to take advantage of the down time during the winter and plan a few trips to do some exploring. We used to take short trips often but Rick's back problems are finally taking their toll and sitting in the car for a day is usually a real drag for him :( I'll just have to grab a friend and see what kind of trouble we can get ourselves into!

Debbie, I love my CPAP, you can actually pull the covers over you head while wearing one. I quit dreaming years ago, and didn't know why. I'm back to dreaming, and feeling refreshed after sleep. I even wear mine for a nap! LOL They (the Dr's) are planning a few more test for Holly's dad, and med changes. The Doc's are saying mitral leak, not prolapse,. To me this is a positive. He's already had an aortic valve replacement, years ago. I guess we'll see what's in store next. Ric

Ric, I never heard anyone before say that they loved one of those masks. Every day brings something new!

Debbie, After my fall down the steps, it was almost 2 years before I could start enjoying drives again. And now I still have to watch not to aggravate some residual Sciatica from the fall. I stop often and get out and walk and that really helps a lot.

Since DSO had his big C surgery, he no longer enjoys long rides, so it has really cramped my wanderings. But maybe this year I can convince him to do one of the drives I've been longing to do for years.

In April the icebergs up in the mid-atlantic start calving. There is a path the calves follow between Newfundland and Laborador. I would love to go up and see some of them. Since he spent a lot of time in the north Atlantic during his Navy years, he's not too thrilled about this idea.

Great stories about your trip stormy... Sorry the eagle viewing wasn't so good. Yes... Linthicum has some awesome photos of the eagels! He has spent quite a bit of time out there in drastic conditions to get his photos too.

Holly, I am glad the cath surgery went well. Keep up your spirits that everything will work out and they will correct the problem.

I'll go with you, Stormy! Lemme just find my long underwear, lol...

DH loves his c-pap too, it's a feeling of relief for him to know that it's going to ensure a good night's sleep. He had to order a couple of different masks before he got the right one.

OK Sheryl!!! Don't you ever wear long underwear in TN? I made a mistake and wore the midweights. I should have brought the heavy weights out. The first night, Fri, I walked around town, I had put on the light silks and they were ok under my cords, but by Saturday, the temps had dropped considerably.

I'm still waiting for the photo of Stormy!

Maybe everyone who spoke to me about their sleeping devices had just gotten them and weren't used to them yet.

What, you want *another* one of the brat?

Okay, how about one with his best buds, Lucas and Mac? They make him look pretty tiny, usually, but he's standing on a box in this pic, lol....

The silk really works? I'm seen them advertised.

I call Ric's C-pap his Darth Vader mask. LOL
Stormy those nieces help to keep you young. Looks like you really did have a nice weekend. No I missed groundhog day pretty much.
The other big PA. news item is the Mastodon. It is pretty big news and it is on display in the State Museum in Harrisburg, just 20 minutes away from my house.
I have a great story about my Aunt Jill. She is just so inventive. I guess you can (or could) donate to the museum towards the Mastodon exhibit. They must have been selling bones. No you don't really get the bone just a plague with your name on it. My aunt went in and wanted to buy a bone and asked if she could have each of her 4 grandchildren's names put on the plaque. They told her for her contribution (a couple of hundred) she could put what ever she wanted on the plague. So they all went to the exhibit opening celebration and there was the plaque with all their names on it. I think they "own" the 5th vertebrae so they counted the vertebrae to find "their" bone. She took sparkling grape juice and plastic cups and they all toasted the Mastodon. What a fun thing to do and a great way to teach younger children about philanthropy. Holly
Here is a link to the article about the Mastodon.
http://thebulletin.us/articles/2010/01/23/arts_culture/doc4b5a2cf52f6f0443244536.txt

Nice pic Pagan, I see you have a bald faced horse. Is that one eye blue? Holly

Yup, bald and wall-eyed, both. He's 1/2 Shire, 1/2 'splash' Paint. That's Lucas.

The next one is Mac- he's the closest thing *I* have to a Mastodon, lol! Great story.

And number 3 is Stormy, my velvet pony. Well, okay, he's not a pony, but he's pretty small and has a deep, soft coat right now.

English ponies are 14.2 Western ponies are 13.1 if I remember right.
I remember going to a Horse Show with a friend years ago. Her DIL's parents had this beautiful Palomino Quarter Horse. It was one of those get to know the In-law meetings. We happened to be visiting her at the time, this was back when we had horses. The DIL's father was the horseman. Good size guy with the Texas hat and "BIG" buckle. His horse was very good quality, expensive (around 20,000) and gourgeous. He was not happy as it wasn't moving in that nice little western walk with lowered head. That horse was just screaming English, head up moving out nice long lines. I told him he needed to get him self some english riding pants and learn how to jump that horse. He just laughed like crazy and said "that ain't happen girlie". LOL Holly

Ha! Hope he got another horse!

20k, shoot. A horse that cost that much needs to be a darn good cook, too....

lol, What Oak Cakes?? They are all really pretty. Do you ride all of them? I love the streaks on Stormy's face. Why do you call him the brat?

Actually, I find the silk long johns to be very nice. I bought them a few years ago at the LL Bean Outlet at the end of the season. Generally, I like CuddleDuds the best, which are mid weights. And my absolute warmest ones are winter gear from Underarmor. My longjohns get used mostly on fall sailing trips and when we go up to the Poconos, which are mountains here in Pa. It's generally not cold enough, or I'm not outside enough in the winter to wear them here.

Holly, I'm going to read your Mastadon article.

Hmm, I always thought that Mastadons were a lot bigger than Elephants, but according to that article they are just about midrange between the size of Asian and African Elephants. LOL I am afraid to ride horses, but I love riding elephants, but boy do you sit high up on them!

Holly, Your Aunt's toast was really cute and yes, it was a good lesson for the kids. I've never been to that Museam, I'll have to check it out. I always used to try to teach my nieces about charity, but I have no clue as to whether or not they give.

The one viewpoint I could never get them to respect was copyright infringement. They were always downloading music from Napster and then foreign cheap sites. They would go on and on about how much they loved this or that musician. I would ask them, well if you love them so much, why do you want to steal their music??? The argument of asking them didn't they want to get paid for their own work never worked either. They were appalled when I refused to let them use my internet connections to pirate music. Their arguments were always that everyone else does it or that Itunes charges too much. But I stuck to my guns about it. Nor would I let them make CDs for me from the music they had stolen. Now the big issue is YouTube, with the professionally made videos..

That was at least 15 years ago and at the time I only knew one other person that had horses that expensive. She wanted to be a big time Paint breeder. Paid a lot more attention to her horses than her children.
It was the only time I talked to him as my friends lived in upstate NY at the time. Not sure what he ever did with that horse but he wasn't the type to keep a horse that didn't bring home the blue. He wasn't a bad rider but I don't know if he was into training. I've seen riders at shows that pull the English tack off and put on Western tack going back and forth from one class to the other. That is just fine if your talking kids at small local shows having fun. LaPetite was fast and Jen did both the Jumping and Gaming at the fun shows. Although LaPetite would have never done that Western trot she was a high stepper. I know some of the 4H kids that went to the Quarter Horse Shows did that, too. But I think as a practice it is general frowned on most horses either do one or the other.

Holly, do you ever come down here for the Devon Horse Show?

Yes, She really does a good job of promoting both service and giving. Both my Aunt and Uncle were school teachers and my Aunt didn't work for most of her children's growing years. So it isn't like they have wads of cash to throw around but they have always believed in public service and promoted that with their children and now grandchildren. I haven't done near as much of that as I could have.
Stormy that is a big discussion. Everything is so out there with little cameras and people taking pics and posting them. I know Ric made a few CD's years ago I have no idea where on the Internet he got the music. It was some site that you could download from and then you couldn't anymore. I think it might have been one of those they filed suits against.

Holly, it's my understanding that photos you take yourself are Ok to publish on Youtube, but say your copy of Michael Jackson's Thriller video, isn't.

No Stormy I've never been to that one. I didn't go to many of the bigger Shows mostly just small local shows, Of course the 4H Distric and State Shows they were pretty big deal for us, Jen rode in those she was a really good rider. The Pa. National Horse Show in Harrisburg was always a big highlight.

I wonder about these videos they put out there of other people doing things. Like someone going off, yelling and throwing a fit in public, Maybe some kind accident or set up designed to make someone look like a fool. I know it is public behavior but there is a difference in something done in front of 20 people and something posted for the purpose of making someone look like a fool that 20 million people will see. It really is just different out there.

I don't watch any of that stuff. Or reality TV for that matter. Youtube is absolutely fascinating. I love the music videos and am always watching the historical film footage. The educational videos are great too. I had the best time finding all of those pumpkin videos for Doc's thread. Some of them are so creative. But you're right, people can be downright mean about posting embarassing images on the internet. My nieces and their friends are always taking pictures, some of which are are fairly eyebrow raising. I'm always cautioning them to be sure no one will post them on myspace.

LOL, at Thanksgiving my niece was laying on the sofa reading a book. Shortly beforehand she had been looking for something in my bedroom. I had left a pink bra with fiberfill cups on the bed. I was in the kitchen doing something. When I went into the living room, she was laying there reading her book wearing my pink bra stuffed with socks over her sweater. It was a really hilarious sight. She weighs about 99lbs. Later, when she wasn't looking, I snapped her photo. She's always pestering me to destroy that photo as if she thinks I will post it somewhere. I like having the leverage!!

LOL, Yes it is always fun to tease them. I love that I can just type in something and up pops all the info I want. Holly

LOL RCN, that is too cute, a juvenile cross dresser. Now how would he feel knowing you put that photo on here??? Is he the one who lives out west?

I always think of those masks as Darth Vader too. I know how your poor friend feels. For a year after I got this Plantar Faschitis, I had to sleep with these hugh boots on. They looked like Moon boots. I had to untuck the bottom of the top sheet or else if I got up at night to pee, I'd be all wrapped up in the sheets and would fall out of bed!!

"juvenile cross dresser" - LOL I won't tell him the picture's here if you won't! My oldest son, Caleb, is the one who lives in Phoenix, Ben's still living in Maine. You'll never see him moving out of the state, he likes his 4-wheeler and snowmobile too much :)

Mum's the word. Caleb is such a neat name. Don't think I've ever met a Caleb.

I remember trying to decide on a name for him. I'm not fond of nicknames but at the time I had just seen the movie, McCabe and Mrs. Miller. I liked the name, Caleb, reminded me of the movie and figured Cabe wasn't such a bad nickname :)

I want to hug those horses Pagancat!!!