Many thanks

Many thanks to everyone who offered words of support or encouragement in response to my last two posts.

I still haven't figured out what is up with the pending divorce. SOMEbody has had a severe change of personality, is the only thing I can figure. These people used to be happy, and now there are restraining orders, accusations of abuse, nonpayment of bills as a punitive measure, all the things one sees in truly ugly divorces. I wish I knew what was really going on underneath all that. Most of all, I wish I knew whether the happiness I thought I saw was really there and has now gone, or whether it was never there at all.

My bereaved friend is eating and sleeping and forming coherent sentences. I feel so badly for her... Almost no further information about the crash is available. Yesterday the weather finally cleared up enough that the bodies could be recovered from the lake, and they are being held pending FAA autopsy. The memorial gathering is Saturday (thus we're not going to Romana's wedding Saturday). I think this one affects me a little more strongly than other deaths in my circle of acquaintances for a couple of reasons: he was almost exactly my age, and it was a crash. Knowing of Dave's death, I face my own mortality more squarely than I do when a seventy-year-old friend who's been battling some disease for ten years dies.

More fluffy update stuff about me in another post. For this post, I am simply very glad to have friends.

My weekend

Saturday: Much organizing and filing of papers. Paid bills. I can see what color the surface of my desk is! That feels very good. Took way too long though. Also went in to work; fair amount of progress on that front as well. I did not run as I was supposed to.

Sunday: Work, a trip to the garden store, way too hot to plant anything or to go hike, back to work again in the evening. Feeling good about how much I'm getting done. Trip planning: we're going to bail on Sweden and do Norway, except for the square dance calling which is in Stockholm. No run today either.

Monday: Flight lesson! First one in ages. Got to go up in Citabria 88408, the plane I last saw after it had been wrapped up in a ball in a ditch after an engine failure. It's been beautifully rebuilt and I'm sure it would fly like a dream if I could remember what the hell to do with the controls. Boy am I ever a rusty, rusty pilot. Signed up for another lesson this coming weekend, since due to Dave's funeral I won't be in Portland. Then a couple hours of work, and a short run (yikes it was hot out), before dinner with gs who graciously looked at all my Half Dome photos and helped me install the top on my new computer desk. Rob and our friend Harry went up to retrieve Dave's car from San Carlos airport. That was the "commuting car"; there's still another car of Dave's (and one of Leonard's -- that's how we knew who else was in that helicopter, the owner of the hangar read the registration info in Leonard's car) in a hangar at Palo Alto.

Good Things: work progress, stuff done at home, run on Monday.
Not So Good Things: no progress writing C3B material, no run Saturday or Sunday.

I smell Indian food. MMMMMMMMMMMM. Time to go get me some of that. :-)

Sleep

Rob had his initial consultation at the Stanford Sleep Disorders Clinic today. The preliminary diagnosis is sleep apnea requiring either a positive pressure mask or surgery. He gets to spend the night there tonight, attempting to sleep with electrodes and probes all over him and a tube down his throat through his nose. I thought that sounded pretty unpleasant. He said "Tonight is nothing compared to the description of the surgery if that's what I need." Yeah, I just bet.

Whether it's sleep apnea or anything else, I do hope the problem can be diagnosed and neutralized. This dude hasn't slept well in, as far as I can tell, his entire life.

Ow (again)

The pain

just never

ever

ever

STOPS

four Advil

three Aleve

what does it take before it

STOPS

"there's nothing wrong with you," says the doctor

"you're perfectly fine"

wonder if he's ever felt like this

and whether he considered it fine

wonder how much convincing it will take

for him to scoop out my guts

so that all this will

STOP