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Pain Pain Pain!

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Augh!!!!  WHAT a way to start the New Year!

My left hip hurts SO much — for reasons that frankly, I do not understand — that I can barely stand up from a chair or hobble across a room. Amazing pain!

Apparently I spavined a hip joint — how, I do not know. The result: pain, pain, pain, and more pain. And no, aspirin doesn’t do a damn thing for it.

Soooo….  I assume that this will go on for at least a couple of weeks — that assumption, based on experience. If it’s not gone after about three weeks, then it’s off to the accursed Mayo Clinic again! 

Ohhhhh my gawd, do I ever hate traipsing to Scottsdale to go to a doctor!

Young Dr. Kildare, that adorable young fella, closed his office up the street here and moved his practice to fukkin’ Sun City. And lemme tellya…

After the monstrous experiences my mother had with her Sun City quack, you could not pay me to go to a doctor out there. Not even YDK. That he opened a practice there does not tell me it’s possible for a Sun City doctor to be competent; it tells me that YDK is very probably incompetent.

The Mayo, as we know, is supposed to be the best. They certainly think so… And bein’ better than anyone else, docs out there peer down their noses at you, condescend to you, and treat you as if you had an IQ in the negative numbers.

But with YDK now ensconced as far on the west side as the Mayo is on the east side, there’s hardly any point in traipsing halfway to Yuma to get care that’s no better than you’ll get halfway to Payson.

We thought medical care in this country left something to be desired, yea verily back in the day? Little did we know! We had yet to experience medical “care” that does not come up to the level of care. 

I suppose I could decamp to Canada, where the socialized system is supposedly somewhat better than ours. Or somewhat worse, depending on your point of view. But…I have an allergy to snow! 😉

{sigh}  My poor li’l dawg! I was going to take her for a walk this afternoon. But…just now I can barely walk across the room…to say nothing of the mile or so around the park.

This hound is not gonna be happy with me when she sees me dodder back into the bedroom and climb into the sack. But…tough nugies, dawg! I couldn’t walk her to the end of the block, much less on her usual park-encircling route.

Outta here!

December 29, Part II

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Well…that must have amused the neighbors no end! 😀  😀  😀

Ruby and I set out for a dusk doggy-walk. We had just gotten under way — literally, just a few steps up the driveway — when OOOOWWWWWWW!!!!!!!

The human’s back went out.

And I do mean out. As in OUT out.

Dunno when I’ve ever had my back hurt this much!

Fortunately, we hadn’t gone far. We managed to turn around and get back in the house…. Lordie!! WHAT would have happened if we’d  been a few blocks down the road???

Now I’m in the bed, cooking the back on a heating pad. Afraid to soak in a hot bath, lest I not be able to climb out of the tub.

Holee mackerel! Lemme tellya HURT!

Can’t even begin to imagine what set that off. Far as I know, no injuries have occurred recently, nor did I make any weird mis-steps. Just out of the blue, pain PAIN PAIN!!!

Weird. 

How is it possible to HURT this much????

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December 26: Oh. My. GAWD! The Pain!!!!

What the heck did I do to myself???????

NO idea. All I know is my left hip hurts so much I can barely walk. And that is NOT an exaggeration!

Launching into the afternoon in a state of High Boredom, I took it into my pea-brained li’l head to walk about 16 blocks easterly, through a side-strip of Upper Richistan, to explore an upscale North Central block of fancy-Dan patio homes. This is a development I’ve long admired. And recently, I’ve taken to thinking I might sell the Funny Farm and buy one of those places.

Thereby freeing me from yard work, pool cleaning, and general hassle. Right?

The place is roughly of this ilk, though not at all the same. It’s in the same neighborhood, though. And “only” 400 grand…

So there I am, going oooohhh ahhh, I could live in THIS place, “when..OWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!”

The right hip goes out.

It goes out…and it STAYS out.

Hurt?   Lemme tellya HURT. 

What I did to set it off, I have noooo idea. But there I was: a good 16 blocks from home. In spectacular agony!

Limped and trudged and trudged and limped and finally after around 40 minutes of struggle, managed to make it back to the house. My GAWD does that hip hurt!!!!!  

And totally out of the blue. What on earth did I do to myself???

So here we are: the dawg and the human, perched on the bed. The human: hips and lower back wrapped in a heating pad, set to “high.”

MIGAWD! I don’t know when I’ve ever had anything HURT so much. And why? how? I have no clue!

*****

Didn’t get much of a chance to look at the real estate over there. And unless this injury (whatever it is) miraculously heals up overnight, I won’t get any such chance. If it’s not better tomorrow, I’ll have to put my poor son up to driving me to the ER. That, or hire a cab.

dayUM, but I’m sick & tired of doctoring. Pray (please!!!) that this hitch-in-the-giddyup goes away by tomorrow morning! 

Our Garden Spot…

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Cop Copter overhead to the north, circling angrily…

BANG! BANGBANG!

Some a$$hole shooting at him, 

Herd the dog inside, follow her in. Shut off the exterior house lights.

Bathe as fast as I can scrub my li’l self. Dry off. Dart into the bed.

Cop is still circling to the northwest, though a further distance away.

And…his copter motor racket fades…he’s sailing off. Thank gawd!

One more gunshot. And now: silence.

 WHAT….

                A…..

                    PLACE…..

And NO, Sun City isn’t one whit better than lovely uptown Phoenix.

Our problem, I fear, is NOT that we’re in the slums of west Phoenix…NOT that we’re dodging bullets in south Phoenix, NOT that we’re trying to look inconspicuous north of the canal, but… Yeah: that we reside in the city of Phoenix. 

Horrible.

Went back and looked at those houses over by the canal, on the east side of ritzy Central Avenue.

Uhh….  huh uh! A dirt path runs behind that little tract of houses, right between their back wall and the canal bank. A perfect trail for every burglar, rapist, and lunatic in North Phoenix.

So…heh…we won’t be looking at that real estate.

Seriously: if Sun City weren’t an hour’s drive away from M’hijito’s house — if it weren’t bathed in the atmosphere of the mausoleum — I would have followed SDXB out there the minute he sold his house and moved westerly, ever westerly.

But I just can’t stand the place. Hated living there when I was stuck out there with my parents. And I sure don’t want to repeat that act. Ugh!

If you wanna live in peace and quiet, d-o-o-n’t retire to Phoenix!!!

Unmerry Christmas

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It’s noon on Christmas day and NOT ONE PERSON has bothered to so much as call on the phone and wish me a Merry Xmas. 

Gosh.

I knew I was repellant, but I had no idea I was that bad. 

🙁  🙁  🙁

The sky is overcast and threatening to rain. Otherwise Ruby and I would set off on a good long hike. An hour or so of walking would shake off some of the depression. But…

But dontcha just know that about the time we get 45 minutes out the front door, the skies will open and POUR on us. So…to say I hesitate to take off down the sidewalk or up into the hills is to understate. Significantly.

*****

Call up SDXB to wish him a Merry Xmas. He’s busy fixing dinner for guests.

He’s still going strong with New Girlfriend. Which is a good thing: she’s really a neat lady, perfect for him, and she lives out there in Sun City, where he does nowadays.

He wanted me to move out there with him, at the time he decided to head west (FAR west) to escape the Tony Situation. But I’d lived there when my parents were holding forth in those parts. And…uhm…nooo thanks!

Not that it’s a bad place. It’s just…well…majestically not to my taste.

But meanwhile, in our parts the Tony Situation has subsided handsomely. Yea, verily: Tony is actually friendly to me. And weirdly, I rather like him. He really is an amazing man.

So any chance SDXB had of persuading me to move back to noisy, dreary Sun City dissolved in that cauldron.

And therefore what I’d really like to machinate, for the future, is staying here in the Funny Farm until I can’t waddle from the bed to the bathroom; then conveniently dying and leaving the place to my son.

Alternatively: sell the shack, take the proceeds, and buy myself into some miserable old-folkerie.

Few things do I detest more than congregate living. But given the track record of longevity in my family, chances are hideously high that I’ll wrap up my life in one of those horrible places. Lacking a nice Golden Gate Bridge from which to take a flying leap….  😉

*****

Have you noticed how ditzy Americans are about the subject of Death & Dying? Poor creatures! They don’t seem to grasp that Death is part of Life…and that if one person croaks over — for whatever reason — the planet does not, after all, stop rotating.

Oh, well.

****

My plan right now is to ask Wonder Cleaning Lady if she can be hired to come in and take care of me during the pre-Demise weeks or (heaven forfend) months. She worked for the Beatitudes and so has experience in that department. The big roadblock, though, would be that she has — of all things– a family(!!). And no doubt will feel little enthusiasm for lurking around all night to babysit an old lady.

She may, however, know how to find sources of 24-hour care…preferably the kind that does NOT require you to move into a dormitory for old bats. We shall see: so far I haven’t worked up the nerve to ask her.

JAYZUZ!!! Check out the entrance fee for The Beatitudes, the most prominent and probably the best of the old-folks’ prisons here.

Welp. Suicide is painless, so they say…

Better that than having to fork over your kids’ entire inheritance to have someone babysit you into the grave….

****

Still Pre-Xmasing

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M’hijito called and offered to drive me to the stores. Convenient, since my car has been glommed and apparently I’m never gonna get it back.

So this is one shopping jaunt I don’t have to make on foot. Would be nice if I could remember what I need to buy…  Ohhhh well…

He, then, presumably is on his way over here.

Ruby the Corgi seems just fine today. She must have eaten something that made her sick yesterday: probably some bug or some human detritus lurking in the yard.

Human: less fine. Hip still hurts so much I can barely hobble around. Oh well. Thass overrode, swa maeg thisse.

Well, hafta say this: I’m so glad I don’t live in Sun City, an hour’s drive away from the young man’s house. My present castle is only about 10 minutes from his place.

This allows me to impose on him with regularity. Today, for example, he’s schlepping up here to haul me to a grocery store.

Others who can be imposed upon do exist here. A guy catty-corner across the street drives an Uber cab for example. He’ll come trotting right over if you pester him.

Turns out we have not one, not two, not three but SIX Uber drivers residing here in the ‘Hood! Can you imagine? We never have to call an actual taxicab!

Weather is a little less spectacularly gorgeous than it was yesterday. Some humidity has rolled in, so the sky is a bit overcast — enough to be kinda gray — and the air feels a bit sticky. Not enough to bellyache about…but not Arizona’s usual spectacular winter weather.

Uh oh…here he is.

And so, AWAAAYYY….