Heading home

 After almost 6 weeks on Salt Spring, we expect to be heading home in a few days. It has been great spending time with old friends in an old familiar area.

Robbie and Ranger (house sit dog) are getting along but Robbie is just being polite... he clearly isn't interested in knowing the first thing about Ranger but he tolerates him.

While we were here we decided to go on a strict reduced calorie diet and we have both lost just over 10 lb so far (3 weeks-ish). Once we get home we have full physicals booked (arranged before we left) and once that is over and bloodwork complete we will be switching to a Keto diet. 

I've been doing a ton of research about it and it seems to make sense to me... other people have been doing Keto for many years and are in fine health because of it. We will be giving it a try. 3 months to start and then we will regroup and make the decision on whether or not to make it a lifestyle choice. Also, after 3 months you are able to re-introduce some extra carbs, because by that time your body will be trained to eat fat not sugar. Anyway, we're giving it a go.

Excited to get home to our friends and our home, Xmas is around the corner and the tree must go up. Dec 1st as some may recall is the day I put our tree up every year. Also, remember to change your smoke alarm batteries.

I have to say, I'll be glad to get home to the Alberta mindset too!

What's been going on

Okay, so I know I haven't been writing. It's been so busy I just haven't had time and frankly I'm losing my mojo for it.

I had planned to transplant the tomatoes today but didn't get to it as I am doing a favour for a friend which is taking up a whole lot of time over and above the norm, I think I'm going to call done on that one because it is very time consuming. She has a table at the local craft fair coming up and I offered to help her.

We are settling in pretty good in our new location. Nice, quiet town. Have made a lot of acquaintances and a couple of friends too.

The local gym is very close to home and they are currently renovating so waiting for that to reopen because -- Oh My God have a packed it on the last 2.5 years. I think we'll pick up a treadmill just in case they lock everyone down again this winter.

We have signed up for curling but haven't heard anything back as of yet. I know they just put ice in the skating rink so I assume it is the same for the curling rink, and hope we will hear something sooner than later. 

Brad's Mum is coming to visit next week so that will be a good opportunity to go the other direction from town (we've only been the one general direction) and see what's cooking out there. We've been told there is a lot to see... may be too cold, but we'll see what happens. Plenty of lakes around us and camping is a huge thing here too.

Quite likely over the winter, assuming things slow down - I'll likely post more regularly. Although, I've been told that winter is the busy season around here with all kinds of activities and events.

Pictures of the tomato transplant coming up.

Hospital, Yard work and an Offer

I managed to pick up whatever bug this is going around - no doubt from Brad who was sick with it for 2 weeks... I only had it for a week but I had other complications it turns out... I just kept thinking it would get better eventually as it did for Brad, but I had symptoms Brad didn't have. Now keep in mind that many years ago I had a stroke and it took me 3 days to get to a Dr, I don't go to the Dr unless things are dire.

So Sunday night, having intended to go to the Dr on Monday morning I was in such a bad way that I had Brad take me to the ER at Royal University Hospital at 11pm. I hadn't slept for a week, hacking, blowing, unable to swallow. I was given some ice chips to help while I waited, after hours in the waiting room we got put into a room an hour later we said to hell with it... by now it was 3am and City Hospital ER opened at 5am, maybe they could help me. So I stopped by the desk to ask for another cup of ice chips before I left. The nurse assured me the Dr was coming momentarily so we returned to wait. Within 5 min he was there, same guy we'd seen wandering around the last several hours. He did get me sorted in short order and they took some blood work to CYA and sent me packing with a 4 day prescription to clear up my throat. It did.

RUH Emergency

While we were waiting to be seen in ER, Brad went out for a smoke (vape). He got to talking to a guy, turns out there is a thing about Vaping... if the nicotine level is too strong it can effect your throat. Monday morning, I researched and found this website with nicotine levels from a large assortment of cigarettes available in Canada. They don't print it on the package anymore!

I had been vaping at 18mg of nicotine for 3 weeks... most cigarettes come in around 10 - 14mg... oops. Knowing that the vape comes in 0mg, 6mg, 9mg and 18mg I realized that what I needed was 9mg so I went back to the vape shop and the same kid was working, I explained what had happened (he was the one who told us at a pack a day we would need the 18mg) and that it put me in the ER. Not in a nasty way, just so that he wouldn't make the same mistake and potentially kill someone down the line with nicotine poisoning.

Content with that, I started doing 9mg and blended the 18mg & 9mg for Brad giving him a 13.5mg. Yesterday I realized that I was low on the 1 bottle of 9mg I had so went back to the vape shop for another and I also wanted two 0mg to blend with the 18mg which would then give us more 9mg once Brad was ready to reduce again.

The Manager happened to be working so I explained to him what happened with the ER and too much nicotine, he advised he would be discussing it with the kid we dealt with. Again, not nasty just making sure the kid understood the importance of what he is selling and how it can affect a person's health. The Manager asked me a couple of questions and it turns out there are two different coils for these vape machines... a 0.60 and a 1.20... the .60 is for a straight to lung inhale (crazy to me) and the 1.20 is for more of a cigarette inhale (this is us). The kid sold us the .60's.... effectively turning our 18mg into 36mg!!!! Holy Mother of God! That's like 6 cigarettes in 1.... No wonder I got so damn sick and couldn't swallow.

The Manager has sorted us out and while Brad (and I) are not impressed that this happened, at least the problem was acknowledged and dealt with to save anyone else from being adversely affected.

We've been puttering around the yard here at Brad's Mum's while she has been away on vacation and got quite a bit of weeding done, put some grass seed down as the lawn was getting some bare patches and even touched up some staining on the deck. I've been too sick until Monday to do much of anything and with Brad's back/neck problems it was a very slow process.

We got an offer on our house!!!!!!!!!!!!

Late Monday we received an offer from our Realtor for our house that we have on the market. So excited! Anyway, it was low as you might imagine (well we expected it anyway, because of the state of the market in our locale), so we have countered. We are waiting to hear back from them as they made the offer and then had to leave on a business trip abroad. Their realtor assures our realtor that he will be able to contact them once they have arrived at their destination and that they are expecting a counter.

Meanwhile another woman was checking out our house so our neighbour took her in to see it. She loved it and apparently intends to contact our realtor to have a proper viewing with her husband.

None of this changes anything until it does obviously, but its a glimmer of hope and after everything we've been dealing with, we'll take it. So nice to get some good news for a change. I've even gone so far as to start thinking of what we will do once the house sells.... no spoilers though.

Incidentally, Brad started his new medication about a week and a half ago and all is well on that front.

Summer plans

Monday morning I wasn't feeling very energetic, I had said I would walk with Roh again and although I had to force myself to get ready and go, I enjoyed it once I got going. We spent the entire hour gabbing and before we knew it we're done. Walking up to the house I see Brad pulling out of the driveway in the Jeep, I had completely forgotten it was Monday - massage day!

Rather than sit around until he returned, I decided to go to PickleBall. While walking past the courts I noted that there were a lot of people there so I popped over and managed to get 2 games in before realizing I was exhausted and heading home.

I am getting stir crazy with this weather. While the fact that it's cold outside isn't a big deal inside the rig, being in this small rig for extended periods is a bit draining. It's been almost 2 weeks of this cooler weather and it's not like we can run off to Oceanside or San Diego to get away from it - believe me, I checked. It's no better anywhere else reasonably close.

We left 'home' 6 months ago (tomorrow) and in some ways it doesn't seem nearly that long and in other ways it seems like that was a lifetime ago. We've been so many places and experienced so many new things, met so many new people, so far this life has been a blast. Well, except for the last 10 days or so..... with the cold temps and periodic rains. Good news is by Monday things are said to improve and who am I to argue.... bring it on, I say.

We have made arrangements for a summer spot, a resort kind of similar to this one but not quite. It has a restaurant and a golf course and they have sites for purchase also. It does not have PickleBall... but there is apparently PB in the local area so I'll likely check that out. There is paperwork which needs to be arranged but what a relief to have a plan.

Robbie is really excited to see Grandma, I've been telling him with words he understands that we will be going to Grandma's soon and his little tail wags and his eyes light up. He's so cute (get's that from my side of the family).

We are getting pretty excited to head 'home' and see everyone again. Especially the Grandkids. Brad's Mum has started her to-do list so that should keep us busy for a little while anyway. I will be having a bath, first thing! I so miss my 6 ft soaker tub at our house... there are hot tubs here at the resort but we haven't availed of them as yet. Once the weather picks up I'm sure I will be all over that.

Though there are 5 pools at this resort, the closest pool/hot tub is for Owner's only, once we became owner's we were busy beautifying our new site and then enjoying it. We did go to the pool one day though, that was the day that I realized I'd brought a swimsuit I've had since I was about 25. Spoiler alert: I'm not 25 anymore. This suit is high cut on the thighs and while I had that to flaunt many moons ago the sun has risen on my rear end many times since then! I have found the suit I want it is a swim dress with shorts... oh yeah! Perfect to cover up the 50 years (okay, 49) of flaws I've earned - the hard way, but earn them I did.

The spot we are planning to stay at with the RV in Canada is a reasonable drive to our home town where everyone except my Dad is. This will allow us to go for visits and still get away to our own spot. We have a favourite area where we will likely put down our 6 month roots and it is in the area of this site so that works out perfect, especially in the summer when it's so beautiful and there is so much to do. We'll be so busy that before we know it November will arrive and our return to Aguanga will be underway.

My morning Blog writing has been interrupted by PickleBall, so the schedule has definitely gone out the window. I'll have to consider going back to evening posts. It never occurs to me when I get home from PB. Uh Oh, speaking of PB, I see Terry getting in his golf cart... hmmm, better get myself beautified......