Friday, March 26, 2010

Excuse making

“Open letter” to all my friends and relatives.


First, Thank-you for all of your Birthday wishes, they were all quite gratifying. To the coffee group at the Eel River CafĂ©, I’m sorry that I haven’t been there of late.



As some of you know, and others might have guessed, I’ve been fighting some mysterious disease. I get up in the morning and feel semi fine, but I have trouble becoming enthusiastic. I feel like doing a few things by about 10:00 am. By 3:00 pm I start dragging and start getting a mild fever (100 deg.) By the time dinner is over (7:30 pm) I can’t wait to go to bed. Last night I slept 11 hours. when I got up, I took two ½ hour naps in my chair.



Now, for the part that is annoying. I don’t feel terrible, just incredibly tired and forgetful, and I make a lot of mistakes. I’ll measure a board and cut it wrong, which is totally out of character for me, and it is embarrassing as hell to be trying to stretch a board when I don’t have the strength to stretch it. The kicker is, this has been going on for 3 weeks now. I whined to some of my friends at Rotary, their advice was, “get used to it”. Bea Anderson said that she had the same thing for 5 weeks and Dennis Abshire has had it for 4 weeks. Other people have said that they have had the same thing. With similar aches, pains, and maladies.



Now the for the good part. I think that I’m getting better. All of those 12 hour sleep-overs and Vitamin pills are staring to work.



Thank-you for putting up with my cranky moods and fuzzy thinking. Well… That is, the ones that did.

26 comments:

Hank Sims said...

Get well, you cranky bastard!

Bunny said...

GEEZ, YOU SCARED ME FOR A MINUTE. You're on medi-care now, go get it all checked out. But it sounds like male menopause to me.

Anonymous said...

It's better than that Bunny, I think since the new health care bill was signed it is free. YAHOO!!!

Oregon

Ekovox said...

Oh, Christ....you were infected by Newcomeritis. You'll have to move away, Ernie and start life elsewhere. It's the only cure. I suggest Bonanza, Oregon.

Anonymous said...

If I had to take a blind guess, I'd say you've been hittin' the bong Ernie.

ultradave said...

Hi Ernie -

Yikes, this was sort of scary to read. I hope you're OK. I plan on reading this blog for a long time so take care of yourself, OK?

gabby haze said...

sounds like a bit of the ague. have you tried a good sarsaparilla tonic?
you take care now.

Anonymous said...

Dang Ernie, just build something out of wood. It doesn't matter if you make the cuts wrong, just nail all the pieces together and call it art.

Oregon

Ben said...

Ernie... Lyme Test! Do it! Peter Stern has the good igenex test.

spyrock said...

i think you have oldtimers. my neighbor steve has been crying about our fence for a couple of years and finally i fixed it with your local product. mendocino fence wood although you say there is no lumber industry up there, they still call it yours and charge you through the teeth for it. at least steve reimbursed me $700 for just the wood and nails while i did all the work for 60 foot of fence and a few extra posts. after awhile, my hands were cramping, my arms were cramping, my back was hurting. i was actually pretty tired and felt like sleeping 14 hours but i have to be at my real job at 6 am.
anyways, i figure i got oldtimers just like ernie. time to just pay the youngin's to do it, whatever that do it is. the trick is finding a youngin' who will do anything.

Unk John said...

The cure for you is to move up here, where the sun shines 58 days a year. What could possibly be a better way to bring you out of your funk?

I'll have coffee with you. Wait a minute... yours will have to be decaffeinated.

Actually, what is the problem with getting a checkup?

Aunt Janet said...

Hey Spyrock,
That is exactly what we do around here. Ever hear about the WWOOF program? Willing Workers on Organic Farms. We are listed in their directory. We got dozens of inquiries this year. We have a young woman staying in our house right now from Nirobi, Kenya. She has helped build our compost heap, including mucking out the cow and chicken barns. she helped move some blueberry plants, stomp down the weeds between the strawberry rows, and plant vegi seeds. We have a couple of guys living here, too to help with heavier chores, like building a compost toilet and shower house. I even have them making wool felt for me in my new machine.
I'm all for getting younger folk to help out. WWOOFers are willing to work in exchange for food and a dry place to live. Some of them move from farm to farm learning about farming, and getting some traveling in as well.
It is more difficult to get local youth to work for us. Though we do pick up a worker or two off the streets of Garborville occasionally, especially around Strawberry planting time. We need about ten workers for two days then. (I'll bet you can't guess what month we plant Strawberries.)Free basket of berries in season if you get it right on your first guess.

Ernie, I'm glad you are feeling better.

Anonymous said...

Dear Ernie,

Belated happy birthday wishes. I wish I had known. That nasty crud thing is odd but it does go away.

Big hugs, Kym

Anonymous said...

Dear Ernie, I'm happy to hear you are feeling better,,, but do you look better?

Oregon

spyrock said...

january. i'm on the lazy son-in-law program. i have this big son in law who at the rate he is growing with have to get a job to buy some clothes that fit. he lives on 20 acres and you would think he would find something to do. but he must be into meditation because that's all he seems to be doing. meditating about why his girlfriend left him, how the bikers poisoned him because he had one of them in a chokehold. how there is no work for union carpenters. maybe i'll tell him about your woof program. he already knows how to do the free room and board.

olmanriver said...

my cranky moods and fuzzy thinking...
Why Ernie, that is our right and perogative as older fellas, people sorta expect it of us...
I tend more toward fuzzy moods and cranky thinking myself.
You rest as much as you need and get well.

Anonymous said...

Ernie, are you improving still? I hope you don't believe in voodoo.

Oregon

No way (now that I know) said...

Is it true that Ernie's Mrs. knits voodoo dolls?

Ernie Branscomb said...

As mad as I get at Hank Sims sometimes, I still like his sense of humor, I use it like a guiding light, and it lifts my spirits.

My bad days are better than old bad days, and my good days are gooder.


Oregon
I'll give voodoo the "hammer test"... nope, not real. It only works on people who believe it does. Why should I add another mental problem to my, already heaped full, mental state?

Ben,
I've considered Lymes Disease, and I would get tested, but I just turned 65. I have been busy filling out miles of frigging government frigging forms that I have little comprehension of. I discovered that you have to fill them out correctly. I filled them out correctly over a month ago, and I expect to see a medicare card any day. I still have Blue Cross, but I suspect they would refuse me at this point. I paid an extra month to make sure that I didn't drop through the cracks. But, here I am, firmly pinched in a crack and not really sure what to do about it. I suspect that my card is here but buried in a tonnnnn of mail on my brides desk, as often happens. As soon as I have my card in hand, I will be tested for every disease known to man. Isn't that the American way? As long as somebody else is paying for it, I by-God expect Carte Blanche. So start sending Obama money, he's gonna need it. I don't want to hear about any “Death Panel” crap! He promised that there wasn't one!

But, would somebody clear up a few misconceptions for me? I thought that all I had to prove is that I'm an American, age 65.

Ben said...

Ernie... The idea that Medicare is free is a lie cooked up by us bleeding heart tax and spend liberals. I was already getting Social Security so maybe it was easier because of that. Medicare was a breeze...BUT, and this is a big BUT, I pay about $100 bucks a month for Part B and I have a supplement plan that costs about $180 per month and a Part D (Thanks W) prescription plan costing $32 per month... So, $300 bucks a month lets me wave and smile as I leave the doctor's office. I am not complaining. It actually saved my life and I sure wish I had gone to see a specialist about a year sooner.

Ernie Branscomb said...

My wife found my Medicare card on her mail stack. It really wasn't her fault, she has been gone from town since it arrived. So, now I'm stylin'.

Ben
I'm glad that you are okay. Now that you have all of your payments done, you don't get hit with additional expenses do you?

Rose said...

Take care of yourself, Ernie. There are a lot of people out here rooting for you.

Anonymous said...

Sorry to hear you were under the weather, Ernie. Take care of yourself and Happy Birthday !

ImBlogCrazy said...

Belated Happy Birthday Ernie!

I've also been grouchy lately. Been getting tired too easily. Looks like a trip to the doc is in order.


Hope whatever ails me comes and goes like yours. I'm trying to stay spry in my sixties.

Unk John said...

Ernie- Ben is right. Medicare will cost you about 1oo bucks a month. It started out at $25/mont, but was raised to $50 a month by, I believe, Ronald Reagan and then to $100 by W. That is for parts A and B. Ernie has a supplement as most medicare people should have and his seems inexpensive.

I, personally, would not touch part D (drugs) with a ten foot pole because, until it is changed, it is a huge rip off of the American taxpayer. Yes, it was put in by George W and it was done in a way that says medicare will pay whatever the pharma companies want to charge. The government has no way of shopping for better deals. They simply pay the money, even though the same drugs can be purchased less expensively from other places, e.g. Canada.

Anyway, welcome to the world of Medicare. Mostly, it ain't so bad. Take care of yourself.

Seriously, come up for some coffee.

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