The things you learn to laugh at when you get old

There are a lot of words I can't summon up when I need them these days.  I have told my family it's fine to help me figure out what I'm trying to say.  In fact, I encourage it.  I make jokes about it often.  I wouldn't be a bit surprised if it's dementia.  One time maybe three or four years ago I mentioned online that I probably had dementia and several people said I should get checked.  

I am not going to do that until I start making things rough on my husband, and then he can figure out what he wants to do with me.  Meanwhile, I have fun with  it.  Please don't comment telling me I really should get tested.

I am now so old that I have to go to the doctor every six months!  My kidneys are apparently getting tired, so the doctor has me come in for blood tests, so I went yesterday.  When I got up this morning at 4 A.M. and finally checked my email, my test results were there.  I saw there were three things that were "off":  Creatinine, serum high (but not much); Glomerular filtration low (but very little); and calcium, serum, which is only 1 point away from being high.  Doctor Google told me I have, or maybe almost have, a kidney disease.  Barely.

A nurse called at 8:30 to tell me she had my tests back; "I know," I said. "I googled them."

She had trouble talking after that because she couldn't stop laughing. She was still giggling when she hung up. By the way, she said this test turned out a little better than the one six months ago.

I might make it to 80 years old yet.

I've had a couple of nice days

Well, I skipped going to my two churches today because Cliff so enjoys having me with him watching the Chiefs.  They were playing in Germany starting at 12:30 P.M. their time (8:30 our time), and he'd have been watching alone if I'd gone; then he would have driven to town to pick me up, and would have missed a very important part of a game that was full of ups and downs in the second half.  Whew.  I'm too old for that much excitement, but GO CHIEFS!

I got out of bed at 5 A.M. to find that my husband had already turned back the clocks back.  The time change didn't bother me at all.  I actually embrace our regular hours as opposed to daylight savings, because I can see the sun rise while I'm the only one awake.  There's a bedroom on the east end of our trailer house, and when I notice it's getting light outside, I walk down the hall and look out the window to see the sun coming up.  The rising sun represents hope to me, telling me I have one more day.  When I'm looking out at the sun, I often think about the song Whispering Hope.  Hope does whisper to us, I believe, in a still, small voice.  Here's what I saw out the window this morning:

I went out yesterday and got my garden ready for winter.  The tomato cages are gone and the trash from the tomato plants was hauled away behind Cliff's tractor; I cut down the tall, dried-up okra plants.  I also hoed a few weeds here and there.  It was good to be out taking care of my garden even though I won't be planting anything until at least March.  I thanked God for the hope of another spring.  

I've been sharing pictures of my garden all year, so I decided to show you what my garden looks like when it's finished for the year.

  The strawberry plants are still as green as ever.  That's why  I haven't put straw on them yet.

I love living so near the garden.  The straw you see near the fence is protecting three blueberry plants from the cold that will soon be coming.  There are some cabbage plants on the left that didn't get big enough to harvest before the hard freeze we had.  But I'm still eating turnips!

Peace.