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REXTINE1's Recent Blog Entries
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Saturday, June 19, 2010
I got up and was planting St. Augustine Grass plugs by 6:30 this morning. It takes a little 6-6-6 fertilizer, a hand trowel, some water, and some plugs. I also used a pair of kitchen shears to cut some of the plugs apart.
First you dig a hole in the ground (sand) the right size, then you scatter a little fertilizer on the bottom and work it into the sand. Fill the hole with water, put the plug in after the water sinks in, firm up the sand around the roots so no air gets to them, and put another cup of water on the planted plug. It's so simple a child could do it.
Unfortunately the plugs don't like to come apart. They come in a gray of eighteen plugs, three across and six down, in little three inch square holes. The grass has spread runners and roots from one hole to another, so a tray tends to turn into a solid mat of grass instead of nice little pots of grass. That's why I went into the house to get the shears. I got three trays of plugs yesterday, and intended to plant them all this morning, but it didn't work out.
After I cut most of the first tray apart because only a few plugs would come out relatively easily, I had a revelation. I turned the tray over and found that I could pull them apart far enough to identify the one strand of either grass or root that needed cutting, so the last few plugs in that tray weren't so hard. With the second tray I flipped the thing immediately, and soon learned that if I worked everything out of the tray I could grab one plug and work it loose, sometimes with pretty hard jerking and wiggling. That gave me more grass that went into bare spots.
By the time I finished the second tray I was well soaked in sweat, and tired enough to be shaky, so I decided that the third tray could wait until tomorrow. It was 8:40 then, and getting fairly warm, so I left my shirt on a hook in the garage, cooled off inside, and had my shower and shave to start the day.
I was extra tired, and couldn't figure out what happened until about 1:00 when I remembered the new medicine, tamsulosin. I wasn't supposed to drive for 12 hours after the first dose, and let the doctor know if I was dizzy or fainted. I was and am OK except for feeling like someone had beat me up.
Friday, June 18, 2010
I can't figure out a catchy title for everything that goes in here, so I'm using the date. I don't think anyone will care about that. Today was my workout day, and I'm getting serious enough that I had to take off my shirt to keep cool, and rest a little between exercises. I did do my solo three miles and dogwalk mile, but overslept and didn't get started until about 6:20. I wasn't in any hurry because I needed to fast until 10 AM for the blood draw.
I got the older woman today, and I just barely felt the needle touch me, which is the way I like it to be and why I keep going back to the same place. Last week one of the women was on vacation, and I got a young woman who was supposed to be expert, but it still hurt quite a bit. When I asked her why it hurt, she said that it just does "sometimes". If I get her again, I'll see what her score turns out to be.
We haven't had supper yet, but I got out a salmon-burger for me. I'll have it with onion, tomato, and fat free mayo on an onion bun. I don't know what else the BW will come up with, but I can always have an apple for desert, and an ice cream cone for a snack. Or vice-versa.
I bought three trays of Floatram St. Augustine grass plugs today (54 plugs) and I'll scatter them around in the front and back yard tomorrow early in the morning. We are starting to have a lot of St. Augustine in the yard now - the west side of the house is solid St. Augustine where there was once nothing but sand and a few weeds. There is also a nice solid patch on the east side, and a lot spread along the east and north fences. It seems to take about two years to get a really good stand of the stuff, and I because a convert when I found the "Southern Weed and Feed," which nourished only St. Augustine, Centipede Grass, and Zoysia grass. It has a pre-emergent herbicide and broad leaf and other grasses killing chemicals. I now understand why St. Augustine is so popular in the south.
If necessary, I'll walk during the day and let the dogs have a holiday. I need to plant a little more grass.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
I only walked 2.36 miles this morning because I had to see my internist at 9:00, and he works in Oldsmar. I did work up a sweat, have a shower, breakfast, and read the paper, but before I could come home I stopped in at the Oldsmar super Walmart and got another pedometer. The one I just bought disappeared yesterday. Besides a prescription for Flomax, I was directed to see my dermatologist for the thing on my forehead. The stuff on my body and leg was nothing, but the forehead thing looked like a basal cell carcinoma to Dr. Falla.
I dropped off the prescription at Walgreens on the way home and picked up at 1:00 PM. Now I have three weeks to see if it does any good before seeing the urologist.
The interesting thing that happened was an offer to sell me some stock from my bank. Since I check these things, I know it's losing about six million a year, and has been getting a little worse. It's listed as below average by the raters, but the letter talks about the improving profits and the new IPO that is only 2/3 sold after 8 months on the market. I can get in for only $12K now instead of the $24K that was the original requirement. After a short consideration, I decided that my original plan to stick with 5 star mutual funds with a long and good track record is still a good idea. I'm glad the government insures my deposits.
Other than that, I went to TOPS, am in leeway, and still have to eat another cup of yogurt of some sort to make the minimum calories for today (get them over 1500). When you consider that I had lunch by myself, then another with the BW, then supper after TOPS, and watermelon for dessert, it's kind of surprising.
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Everything seems to be going well today, except that the day is passing too quickly. I slept in this morning, and didn't get out of the house until 7:20. I have been going to sleep too late to get a full eight hours, so today I didn't set the alarm and deliberately went back to sleep at 5:30. I still felt a little tired, but finished the first three miles in fine shape. It was cloudy at first so I took a ball cap with me, but the sun didn't come out until I was nearly home. Then I took the dogs on their one mile walk and made their day. There was something going on at the Community Center, a race or triathlon at the Y, and a ball game at the high school baseball stadium, so there were a lot of runners and cars for them to warn off.
Adrienne came home with a fancy long sleeved shirt for Father's Day. It fits OK, but I have to unbutton the cuffs to get my hands through the arms. It's one of those tricky ones with an "open" back which means there is a vent with cloth screen underneath across the back. I can't see the difference between cloth hanging down your back and open at the bottom and cloth continuous to your pants. I'll try it out and see, but I don't think it will be any cooler than a regular shirt.
Unfortunately, I have a combination of old age and sun damage to the skin of my arms, especially the left one, so if I even brush against something and it is a little sticky, the skin parts and blood leaks out. The skin is about as strong as wet tissue paper. After reading up on it, the best advice is to wear long sleeved shirts, so I bought a bunch of them. Unfortunately, they are warmer than short sleeves, and it turns out that I still get in trouble with long sleeves - just not as often.
The best thing I did was to do away with aspirin and fish oil. That way the blood clots and I don't spread as much around when something happens. Before, the first time I knew anything had happened was when I felt blood dripping from my fingers.
I guess this entry got away from me. I didn't know what to talk about and it just turned into a stream of consciousness spewing out. Sorry there's no point.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Last night I noticed that there was a place to log in (user name slot and password slot) on the SparkPeople search engine page, and decided to log in that way. I had finished supper and wanted to enter my food. I was shocked when I came up with no Spark Points, only two friends, (the big guy and Eleni) no awards, and Eleni's start date on the Profile section of the main page. I couldn't figure out what had happened, so I spent about an hour doing everything over again, and wound up with about 120 points.
Today, I logged in the normal way, and got to the same place. I was pretty bummed out because I just lost 2 1/2 months worth of history, but went ahead and put today in the new, strange place. Fortunately, I didn't have to figure out a lot of stuff and I managed to set it all up again, with a page and my picture and a profile, etc. after I was done with all the bookkeeping and banking for Kiwanis. We had a meeting this morning, and I received checks from Marty and John Kiker both.
While I was messing around after I had everything set up, I found a message from yesterday, and saw my old page with everything on it. I also had the new page open at that time, and I was able to look at both of them (one at a time) until I finally logged off again.
Later, after a snack, I came back, logged on, and found the original page. It was great. My user name is stored on the normal login site, and I only have one password, so I'm sure I wasn't doing anything wrong most of the time. I now had everything set up and two days' data in the new page, and a blank today in the old page. So I loaded it up and went away.
The next time I came back I logged in, after closing the page and using the "log in here if you're a member" I was on the new page. Talk about frustrating. Eventually I logged in twice there, using rextine and got to the new page, then I logged in using rextine1 and got the old page.
Now whenever I log in at the site with the stored user name, I get the old page. I hope it stays that way, and I hope no one else ever has this trouble. The only friend left was Eleni, and my start date was two years ago instead of 2 1/2 months ago. It was really confusing.
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