Just need to talk to my friends (199)

Hello Everyone! Beth, where did you move to? The sunsets are really nice.

Jo C, when I was so, so tired from lupus, I only bedrest helped me. After a while, I was able to have little bits of energy. Also, make sure you are not anemic, because inflammatory diseases cause anemia. You might need some packed red cells. Enjoy your visit with your daughter. Is she close to a Buckees? Where I live we have not had Trick or Treaters in years, and I'm glad about that. I don't like strangers showing up at my door. I turn my lights off and I go to the bedroom where no one can see me.

David, I'm glad you enjoyed your Elvis impersonator. I saw a good one also last year.

Lorita, do you know how in a scary movie they will show a face that devolves into a monster face? Well, this is what I have been seeing lately as I am trying to fall asleep. I keep seeing horrible faces and other horrible images devolving from normal images. It's been happening about the same time as I began my new medication. I hope this is a coincidence, and not a side effect. I'll have to look into this.

Sandy, how nice that your new hubby wants to show you the world. Does he have a single brother? I'm not kidding.

Littleme, my travel club is offering a trip to Australia and New Zealand in 2026. I'm thinking about it.

I had great news today! I had a visit with my neurologist whom I began consulting in 2008. He gave me a diagnosis of cognitive impairment not otherwise specified and started me on Exelon patch. Today, after years of cognitive tests and MRIs and PET scans and cognitive blood tests, he changed my diagnosis. He declared I have no evidence of a degenerative brain disorder. He changed my diagnosis to adult attention deficit. This was quite a welcome surprise for me! My latest cognitive tests were all in the normal range, although my working memory was somewhat low, but still within normal. Hallelujah! I am so happy!

Iris

Wonderful new Iris!

So very glad that you and your doctor have stuck with it to get the improved outlook.

Good morning.

Iris, that is such wonderful news for you. It made my day.

It's a lovely day here. Sunny, warm and breezy. We're supposed to meet friends for dinner if I can get my residual cough under control.

It's been a roughish week. The hurricane aftermath pictures are difficult. I have a little PTSD from a couple of floods— once when I was evacuated with my son when he was 5 months old which was harrowing and later when our home was destroyed. Those poor people. I lost stuff— mostly replaceable. Some of these folks have lost loved ones in the context of a community that has been wiped out in the same event. I can't imagine.

I've had a nasty cold the beginning of the week. No flu or COVID— just a miserable cold. I had to take mom to her post-op appointment, so we masked up and opened the windows, but somehow she still got sick. I took her to the grocery story while I waited outside, so maybe she picked it up there. Who knows?

I met up with my niece in the city for haircuts and happy hour. It was nice, I don't get to see her often enough because she's so busy. She filled me in on her trip with mom to MA. She noted a lot of what I am seeing and fully supports the next steps with the memory center when they call back. I would have gone forward anyway, but having some consensus is reassuring. She did complain about me packing for her, lol. It seems she thought I'd forgotten to pack 2 tops she asked for— they were dark-colored and on the bottom of the bag so she didn't see them. Poor thing.

Niece's oldest and dearest friend (they met in dance class when they were 3) was recently treated for triple-negative breast cancer and it seems to have spread. This is very sad and ominous news. Another friend of hers died last month after a fall that left her in a coma for months. Facebook sent me a memory this morning from 10 years ago when we participated in a walk to benefit one of her late boyfriends' pet charities. That was such a sad time. These are/were such young people. Niece's wedding anniversary is this week, so she and her DH are headed to a resort in the Caribbean for the week.

HB

here….

I'm glad not to have a cognitive impairment diagnosis, but I have had significant memory loss, more than I believe is associated with adult ADD. I still have memory loss, but apparently it's not too abnormal. I know that Best Practices has been helping me.

Lorita, I hope Darwin did not have his phone on mute so that you could not hear him.

HB I hope you are resting and recovering from your cold. When I have a cold, I cannot do anything. But I have lupus, so that probably affects my virus-fighting abilities.

Iris

Iris L,This the third time that we have seen him . He said that he hopes to be in the area for Christmas and I hope he does return to the area an d we will see him again

Good morning

Lorita hope the guy coming can help you

Good morning and Happy Sunday,

My daughter and her family are on the way home from Disney and the beach. The other daughter is in Biloxi, MS for work, so she's flying home to Ohio tomorrow, Prayers for safe travels.

So this afternoon, we will be a houseguest and dog free home again. It will be good to spend the next week cleaning and getting ready for fall/winter.

Have a good day everyone.

My goodness Lorita, you are having a difficult time with water at your place. It doesn't even make sense to me that the shower doesn't have water. You have water everywhere else? This has puzzled.

It's back to being warm here. Mid 90's every day, its just getting old!! But I certainly don't want to complain, we have a house and an air conditioner - two things so many in our country don't have right now. The damages from the hurricane are simply unbelievable. So many people affected and now another hurricane is heading for the Florida coast.

I have paperwork to catchup on, be safe everyone.

Judith, I use dryer balls and I'm satisfied with them. For my blouses I use the dryer sheets that are supposed to remove pet hair. I just purchased laundry sheets. I liked the results of the one load that I have used.

Iris

Lorita, I have those fur-catcher things to use on the washer too, but I haven't used them yet.

Iris

Good morning.

My 12-hour cough syrup only lasted until about 4am, so it's another early start to the day. Ugh. My lack of sleep is leaving me feeling like a real slug of late. My major accomplishment yesterday was organizing my first aid kits. DH stubbed his toe on the leg of the desk in his library and ripped the skin which triggered me digging around for just the right stuff. The big box was like some kind of time capsule— Bactine that expired in 2003, bandages from Eckhard Drugs which was taken over by Thrift in the last century. Yikes. I have a tidy box upstairs, refilled my kitchen stash for cooking injuries, and made smaller kids for my purse and car.

I got this done just in time, DS sent me a picture of his hand which he got caught in a trap (that's the floor piece that covers the steps in a passenger car vestibule if boarding is done from a platform. He's going to need a tetanus shot today. He said the other trainman said the same. Evidently this man "was a doctor". This should be an interesting story. I figure he can hit CVS between classes.

Lorita— I'm sorry to hear of your continuing plumbing woes. I wonder if your shower head got clogged— they can clog up pretty easily. I've sometimes removed the head and soaked it in distilled vinegar for a bit which does the trick.

About Darwin's wife, does she take any medications? SSRIs like Zoloft, Prozac and Lexapro can cause very vivid dreams and nightmares. If she's been prescribed one of these medications, that could be part of the problem. He'd want to discuss with her doctor as stopping a SSRI cold turkey can be dangerous.

Beth— That sounds like a fun tour. We have about a dozen covered bridges in our county. The nearest on is 2 miles away in a park, but a number of them as still used as bridges. It's always a treat when I find myself detouring, aka lost, on some back road and find one.

Jerilynn— Enjoy your empty nest for the moment.

Judith— If your towels are stiff, it's likely you're using too much detergent. It was a hard habit for me to break— I'm a "if less is good, more is better" kind of person— but using just a couple Tbs of detergent is best. But first, I had to get all the residue out of them. I did several washings with baking soda for the wash and a cup of distilled vinegar for the rinse. You shouldn't use fabric softener of any kind on towels. Some folks go so far as to strip their linens by soaking in hot water with a mix of 1 part borax, 1 part washing soda and 1 part detergent for a couple hours. Wring out and run them through a cycle in the washer without detergent.

I use dryer balls almost exclusively these days when I can find them. I like fabric soften for my clothes, but DH and DS have such reactive skin, I'd never get out of the laundry room.

HB

Good morning on the way to the grocery store.