1. For at least ten years now, the crucial health question before me has always gone something like this: we see what the blood work numbers say, but more importantly, how do you feel? This question became especially important about ten years ago when my GFR dropped below 20. It's at this point that it's recommended patients with kidney disease begin the process of becoming listed for a transplant. It was Dr. Zakem, the last time I saw him in 2014, who told me it was time to enroll and that I should get that process underway once we moved to Maryland. Once in Maryland, my new nephrologist, Dr. Malik agreed.
I had plans in the late fall and early winter of 2014-15 to help out with Mom's care in Kellogg, but once I returned to Maryland, I began the process and by about March or April of 2015, I joined the transplant list.
Sometime, after that, in both Maryland and later in Spokane, my kidney numbers dipped to a range that, if we only went by the numbers, I would begin dialysis.
But, the doctors always asked the same crucial health question: "How do you feel?"
My answer was always the same: "I feel great!"
So we never started dialysis.
I bring this up because today, on the seventh day since testing positive for Covid, I took another home test.
As I had on Monday, July 1, today I tested positive.
And then I asked myself the crucial health question: "How do I feel?"
I feel good.
No headache. No body aches. No sore throat. No fever. No loss of taste or smell. No persistent cough.
I occasionally sneeze and from time to time I need to blow my nose.
I'm a little bit more tired than usual.
Short naps restore my energy.
So, I'm disappointed that I didn't test negative, even though the transplant team told me I might test positive for as long as ten days (or more) as is common with transplant patients.
But I'm heartened by how I feel.
I'm heartened that I've never run a fever. I'm heartened that I feel stronger than I did even a week ago. It doesn't seem like my bout with this mild, but persistent, bout of Covid has done much to stymie my overall recovery from kidney transplant surgery.
2. I got caught up today. I went back and completed the Friday NYTimes crossword puzzle and then I tackled the Sunday puzzle and completed it, even though I didn't figure out the puzzle's theme/gimmick until I was done. I enjoyed working this Sunday puzzle, even as I wondered what the deal was with the odd theme answers. What did I think once I understood those odd answers and how they fit with the theme? I could see the cleverness it took to create this puzzle. It had an element of fun. I wish I'd enjoyed it more -- I mean, what's wrong with me? Maybe I'm becoming a crossword puzzle sourpuss in my old age!
3. I might have been a sourpuss about the Sunday puzzle, but I was NOT a sourpuss this evening as I about watched Nick Nolte and Eddie Murphy in the movie, 48 Hrs. I'm happy when this movie came out that I was, and continue, for the most part, to be a devotee to watching movies that I guess you'd call art house movies. But, recently, I've wanted to watch action movies, especially once I passed over back in the 1980s. I began scratching this itch with Beverly Hills Cop and enjoyed it so much that I had to go back to Eddie Murphy's first movie and watch him partner up with Nick Nolte in 48 Hrs.
I'm glad I did. I not only got caught up in the suspense of the movie, in the way Nolte and Murphy played off of each other as mismatched, almost accidental partners in running down two ultra-violent cold-blooded killers, but I also thoroughly enjoyed the movie's atmospherics. I thought the opening scene featuring a work crew of prison laborers in oppressive heat was perfectly staged and, as the movie progressed into one sketchy, gritty San Francisco locale after another, I thoroughly enjoyed the cramped police precinct, the claustrophobic jailhouse holding Eddie Murphy's character, the rundown hotels the killers holed themselves up in, the redneck bar Eddie Murphy's character intimidates into submission, and the hazy final scene staged in a back alley in San Francisco's Chinatown.
The movie's music soundtrack was also terrific, especially when the movie featured live bands playing.
I'm a sucker for subway stations and trains in movies. I had a blast watching this part of the movie unfold.
I sure understood, as I watched this movie and thought about my movie viewing habits over forty years ago why I'd never watched it until now.
Now, however, as I move into my 70s, I've loosened up. I'm more accepting. Whole new areas of movie viewing are opening up to me -- oh, I'll never stop watching art house movies and independent films, say, on the Criterion Channel. But, I'm ready to venture into movies I ignored in the past and am thinking that it might be time to watch Mel Gibson and Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon. I also have No Way Out on my radar. Who knows? I might enjoy Kevin Costner in 2024 after not enjoying him much in the 1980s. I mean how far will this accepting spirit take me?
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