Little is happening of late, after the mayhem of course. The dogs are enjoying their morning naps. I think I’ll join them in a bit. As for my hand, it still hurts, and it still makes life complicated. My left hand just doesn’t do. In order to bring my coffee to the den I rested the cup on my right hand and held it with my left. It jiggled. I was careful.

When I was a young kid, all of four, I broke my right wrist jumping off a fence backwards. I used my hands to brace my fall and ended up with a buckle fracture. I thought the cast was a badge of honor. Oddly enough, not more than a few years ago, I broke my wrist, the same wrist as before, but no badge of honor this time, no cast. My finger fracture is hidden by the wrap. I see the surgeon Saturday. I’ll also get to see my finger with all its gory details.

When I was growing up, I was an active kid. I was a brownie first then a girl scout. I even got my ten year pin. From the time I was ten until I left for the cape, I marched with St. Pat’s Shamrocks drill team. In the winter, we practiced at the armory, a really neat building. I used to bring index cards with French vocabulary and whatever else I had to memorize. At every break I studied my cards. We were learning our summer routine. In the summer, it seems my whole life revolved around drill. All my friends were in drill. We practiced a couple of times a week and competed on the weekends, sometimes both Saturday and Sunday. When we didn’t have a contest, we’d go to one to watch. I remember when we won our first championship. We got off the bus in the square and matched pass the fire station and the town hall to the schoolyard. They firemen blew the fire whistle as we marched pass their station. We were giddy.

I also remember the first time we ever placed at a contest. It was in Lawrence, and we came in second. I was so proud when I got home and told my parents. What I didn’t tell then was there were only two drill teams in the competition.

Last night the thunder was right over my house. Poor Nala shook. I was surprised as this was the first time she’s ever reacted to thunder, but it was loud and close. I put my arm around her, and she settled a bit. After the thunder stopped, the rain came. It was heavy at first and pounded my roof and windows. I listened and wished I had a metal roof. That’s about when I fell asleep.

My finger where the fracture was still hurts. I get quick painful knife thrusts mostly in the late evening and first thing in the morning. During the day it’s okay as long as I keep it still which is nigh impossible.

Today I have to go to the dump. The trash has been in the car since Thursday, and I have two more bags to add. I have a short grocery list with dog food topping that list. Not on the list but critical to my mental health and well-being is something gooey and sweet. I deserve it.

When I was in Ghana, gooey and sweet were rare. My treat was a bottle of Coke and a candy bar. I could buy a Ghanaian bar, a Golden Tree bar, but I preferred Cadbury, and I was on a Cadbury fruit and nut bar kick for a long while. My friend Bill and I would ride in the late afternoons on our “motos” to the DPS store around the corner, not far from our houses. It was always stocked with Coke and candy. This was not an every day event because of the cost so it was an Event with a capital E. I’ve told you before about the small girls selling bofrot or puff puffs from the box with glass sides they carried on their heads. The bofrot looked like donut holes and tasted like plain donuts. I could never resist. On each trip back to Ghana, they are what I look for second after kelewele, a plantain dish.

Nala got into the Jack’s room this morning. I hadn’t secured the gate. When I heard noises, I went to check and found packets of unopened cat food on the stairs. All the packets have pumpkin in them. Jack hates the food so Nala making off with one packet was wasting her burglary talents as I intend to mix the pumpkin with the dogs’ dry food. As my mother would have said, “Waste not, want not.”

I am watching Sharktopus. I think I gave away the whole plot by telling you the title.

My pointer finger on one hand is down for the count while the one on the other is working above and beyond expectations making me the world’s fastest one handed typist. I am also the master of typos. I’m almost inclined to leave them as part of a contest to correct the errors. I even mystified Duck Duck Go. I’d call it Guess the Word.

Last night I went to bed and didn’t take my pain pill because it wasn’t quite time. At 5 am I had no choice. I went downstairs. The dogs followed. I let them out, took a pill and went back to bed. We all slept until 10:30. I’m on my second cup of coffee.

Before I left the hospital I had dinner: pot roast, mashed and carrots. I had chocolate pudding for dessert but by-passed the other dessert, the brownie, too hard, tooth breaking hard. The mashed were perfect. I could make a meal out of mashed with gravy. I did the old trick I used to do as a kid: capture the carrots with the potatoes. That made eating easier. The only sad part was I couldn’t cut the meat. I used my fork and sort of sawed it off. The nurse saw me struggling and cut my meat. I was back to childhood, having my meat cut again.

Yesterday I had a revelation. Before the incident, I had bought a variety of cereal in the small boxes, but I only had a few left, one being Fruit Loops. I ate them for dinner. They were tasty. Who knew? I seldom strayed as a kid from my Rice Krispies. The only two boxes I have left are hay bales, my name for Shredded Wheat. I have a box for lunch and another for dinner, no meat to cut.

I have my car. I’ll need to go to the dump tomorrow as there are bags of trash in the trunk. As Robert Burns wrote, “The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men. Gang aft a-gley.” I had planned to go on Thursday but then came the mayhem.

Today is cloudy but warm. I may stay on the deck and read, the perfect plan.

Where have I been for the last two days? At Cape Cod Hospital. Why? That’s the story so here I go.

On Thursday morning I started my usual routine. I let the dogs out: yup, I was the one who let the dogs out. When they came back inside, I gave each of them a biscuit. One biscuit fell on the floor then the two dogs went at it. I tried to stop them, a stupid idea. I got badly bitten on my right hand. Blood spewed, but I continued to try and stop them anyway. Finally, I broke them apart and got Nala in the bathroom. I grabbed a towel and covered my hand, my bleeding hand. I left Henry in the house and drove to the hospital. The ER doctor had my hand x-rayed. My pointer finger was fractured. The bottom of the finger was shredded a bit. The ER doctor called the hand surgeon who said he’d be there in the morning. I was admitted. My finger was gauzed, an anti-bacterial drip and a pain killer were started, I put on a lovely Johnny, a flowered one, got into bed and met all the nurses.

I called my family and friends. I had the worst night. I couldn’t sleep, going to the bathroom was a trek and nothing good was on TV.

In the morning, I waited for the surgery. I waited until nearly two, then was wheeled to the surgery rooms where I met the surgeon, the anesthesiologist and several nurses, two of whom were former students. We got a few chuckles about that one and talked about their office visits. An oxygen mask was put on me, and that was the last thing I remembered until I woke up with a gauze covered right hand. We all chatted then I was wheeled to my room where I was given something to dull the pain. I called my friend who was coming to get me. She brought clean clothes and waited. The nurse gave me the discharge sheets, got my prescriptions filled and sent me on my way. I had to be driven home or they wouldn’t have let me go.

I got home where the dogs were thrilled to see me. My friend had cleaned the blood, and she and one other friend took care of the cat and dogs. After my friend left, I settled in as did the dogs.

What’s left? I have to get my car at the hospital and go to the dump. The car is filled with trash as the dump was my actual destination Thursday. I was waylaid!

The staff at CCH is beyond amazing!!

PS I had to type this with one finger!

The morning is ugly. It is only 65° and cloudy and damp. The day won’t get much better though it will get just a bit warmer, up to 68°. It’s time to break out those bathing suits! The dogs have been out a while. They enjoy this weather. I figure, though, they’ll soon be inside as it is morning nap time.

When I was a kid, our dog Duke was not allowed on furniture, but he was a smart dog. At night he slept on the couch. We knew but never caught him. When we walked downstairs in the morning, we could hear him get off the couch, but he always greeted us at the foot of the stairs. When he was really old, he slept in my bedroom on my shaggy white rug, the one with a bite out of it from my hamster who had pulled part of the rug into its cage, chewed off a piece and made quite the comfy bed.

When I was a kid, the weekdays were all the same. My mother woke me up, and I went downstairs where breakfast was already on the table. After breakfast, I’d get dressed, grab my school bag and lunch box then leave for school. It wasn’t a long walk. It was a straightway once I got down the hill, maybe about two blocks. In school, it was the same subjects in mostly the same order every day. The only differences were art and music which alternated days. We ate lunch, had recess then finished the day. I walked home.

My whole week sounds boring, but it never was. I was a kid. I didn’t know boring. Every day was an adventure. Walking to school sometimes meant collecting the colorful leaves. Other days my friend and I skipped to school. I always think of skipping as joyful. In the school yard, before the bell, we met up with friends and chatted though we had seen each other the day before and the day before that. When the nun rang the hand bell, we lined up class by class and two by two in sort of a Noah’s ark impression without the animals. We stored away out jackets in the cloak room, and the day began in earnest.

When I got home, I changed from my school clothes and went out to play, depending on the weather. My friends and I often played games like Red Light, Hide and Seek or Simon Says. In the warmer days, we explored the field and woods below my house. I can still see that field and the dead tree at the end of the field. One giant limb of that tree was across the path. We could have walked around it but we never did. We climbed over it. Kids do that. Easy wasn’t aways fun.

The air is so thick any movement makes breathing difficult. Everything is still, not even a slight breeze can break through the dense, damp air. The sky is gray. It is 67° which will be today’s high. My dance card is empty. Yesterday it was filled. I had a uke concert on Main Street in Hyannis for Open Street Day. The crowd sang along. It was fun. In the late afternoon, I went to the birthday celebration for a friend who used to be my neighbor. Everyone other than myself was Brazilian. We had great food including Brazilian linguica, a favorite of mine. I stayed until the early evening. I wanted to go home to keep the dogs company as they had been alone a good portion of the day. They were happy to see me but happier for the treats. I know my place in the hierarchy.

Few tourists remain except for the busy weekends. The roads are clearer. Travel time is less but harder to figure. Columbus Day weekend will be the last hurrah. The cape will be ours again.

When I was a kid, weekends, most of the year, were not much busier than weekdays though on Saturdays uptown had more cars and fewer parking spaces. It was the weekend errand day. But, in the summer, weekends took on whole new meanings. We often went to the drive-in on Saturday nights after spending the day at the beach or, once in while, a lake, but I remember one Saturday, quite the special Saturday, when my parents told us we were going to have surprise if we were good. They always attached good using their standards, which were seldom ours. Anyway, we got on Route 1 toward East Boston, where my grandparents lived. We were in Saugus when my father announced he was turning around and taking us home as he was tired of listening to us. We begged and pleaded and promised good behavior using his standards if he kept going. After the turnaround, he stopped the car at a parking lot. It was a giant toy store which had behind it rides, including a small roller coaster. I used to see that coaster when we rode by the store toward my grandparents’ house. It was a great surprise. He had only turned around as he was on the opposite side of the highway from the rides. We spent the day there. I think it was on that day and at that place where my love for roller coasters began. I rode it over and over and over.

I’m wearing my sweatshirt. The temperature is only 66°, and it won’t get much higher, but the day is still a pretty one. The air is still now. The sun glints through the leaves and branches of the back yard. I can see the blue sky. It’s a hang around the house day.

I was a sloth. Today I am a corkscrew. The frenzied cleaning of the last few days has taken its toll. Yesterday I hauled up from the cellar the back storm door, cleaned it and put it in the door. That is one heavy door which I could barely pick up so I had to move it from corner to corner then step by step up the cellar stairs. I had to replace the back screen door as the nights are getting cold, and the back door stays open so the dogs can come and go. My back is paying the price.

Yesterday I picked up in the hall what I thought was a dead leaf, but it wasn’t. It was a flat, desiccated creature with a tail and two back legs. It was too flat to figure out what creature it was. I remembered way back when one of my cats was playing with a flat, black something. When I picked it up, I realized it had once been a mouse. Anyway, back to yesterday’s flat black something. I picked it up and threw it over the fence. I thought end of black, flat unknown creature, but I was wrong. Today I saw something whitish on the inside door mat. I went to get it. I was grossed out. It was half a tiny jaw bone with teeth.

When I was a kid, I loved these fall days. I remember riding down the hill, my street, on my bicycle. The wind blew up my jacket sleeves and puffed my jacket. I was cold but thrilled by the speed of my bike. I used to zip across the road to the field below my street. It was my short-cut.

I remember walking the tracks. I also remember when trains, Boston and Maine trains, used to run on those tracks. I was pretty young then. I’d jump off the track and watch the train go by. It was only a few cars. It used to cross William Street where my grandparents lived and stop at Farm Hill Station. I remember we used to put a penny on the track for the train to flatten, and we used to jump over railroad ties with OO on them so we wouldn’t break my mother’s back. We were successful. She never had a broken back.

I’m wearing my sweatshirt. The temperature is only 63°. Fall is next week. I guess today is a dress rehearsal.

It will stay sunny all day and the high will be 72°. I have a couple of chores and a couple of errands. My bed needs changing and the plants need watering. I have a small grocery list, and the dogs need a few cans of food. My sloth day has ended.

I caught Nala trying to get a box through the dog door. She managed to do it before I could stop her. I went into the yard to get the box and found a few things she had stolen from my bedroom. That dog is relentless. I found a bunch of dead leaves on a branch in the living room. I guess Nala figured if I can’t get anything out, I’ll bring it in. I’m just happy nothing is dead other than the leaves.

When I was a kid, I imagined myself as one of the characters in the books I was reading. The Doctor Doolittle series had me wishing I could speak to animals. I’d talk to birds, my dog Duke and a few squirrels, none of whom were yet spawns of Satan. I would be the fifth little woman living through a Christmas without presents. Nancy Drew and I would solve crimes together. I wanted to be one of the characters in any Jules Verne book. I used to check the man in the moon to see if he had his happy or his sad face. To go to the moon in a rocket was almost beyond comprehension. I didn’t care that Captain Nemo was a bit crazed. To be in a submarine looking out a picture window showing the bottom of the ocean filled with fish seemed the height of delight, hand clapping delight. I was never without books especially ones which fed my imagination.

For tonight I’m thinking about having a fire in my chiminea and dinner on the deck. I have pinion wood which fills the air with the sweetest aroma. I’ll buy something special for dinner to treat myself. The dogs will be with me, they always are.

Today is a sloth day. The last few days I have expended vast amounts of energy cleaning the house, and I need to revitalize. I have washed and waxed the kitchen floor, one bathroom floor, the hall and the stairs. I have vacuumed and polished. I have rearranged the den trying for a bit of order, less clutter. I am crazed.

My house and yard have a new rule, nothing dead. Nala was playing with a spawn in the yard, one which had already received its unearthly reward. She’d toss it, play with it and then take it for a run. She wouldn’t give it to me. She brought it through the dog door, probably for a tour of the house. I yelled and she took it back outside. Later, I had to shut the backdoor on the dogs when I went on my errand. The spawn was outside. When I got home, I went through the gate to the backyard, found the spawn and got it out of my yard. Nala never noticed.

This morning is chilly at only 63°. It is a sunny day with a blue sky. The breeze is strong. The high will only be in the low 70’s. The low will be 54°. Summer is waning in the face of fall.

When I was a kid, I loved fall best of all. I’d walk in the gutters filled with leaves on my way to school. The leaves were perfectly piled for wading through and kicking them into the air. It was like a storm of leaves blowing left and right and into the street. Sometimes, though, the leaves on the bottom were wet, even soggy. Kicking them did nothing. They were too wet to move. My shoes got ugly with pieces of wet leaves. I didn’t care. I was a kid.

Once the fall mornings got chilly, we’d have hot food for breakfast. Some mornings we had oatmeal, that thick, lumpy, paste-like oatmeal. I’d pour milk on the oatmeal and add sugar. Both made it palatable. I don’t eat oatmeal anymore. There was always toast, white toast browned perfectly. Sometimes there were eggs, usually soft-boiled. They were my favorite.

My school had no cafeteria so the only hot lunch I’d ever have was soup in my thermos. Mostly it was chicken noodle. My mother always included Saltines. She never missed a beat.

Yesterday I had a grilled cheese sandwich with tomatoes for dinner. I yummed my way through each bite. The dogs got none of it. Some things are just not meant for sharing.

Yesterday it rained most of the day. The humidity stayed high even after the rain had stopped. The air in the house was so thick I turned on the AC and had a comfortable night sleeping. Today is cloudy and damp. Thunder storms are predicted for this afternoon with a high of 76°.

Nala has had a wonderful time. Last night, when she didn’t come in, I went looking. I saw her near the deck with a dead something in her mouth. I tried to have her drop it. Nope! She ran around the yard with her trophy. I decided to go back into the house. I shut the back door so she wouldn’t be tempted to bring the dead thing into the house. Not five minutes later, she was whacking the door so I checked, no dead thing. I let her into the house. This morning it was a loaf of bread, a brand new loaf of bread I had just opened so I could have toast. I put the bread into the toaster then answered the phone. When I went back to the kitchen, I saw it was gone. I raced outside. Nala had the loaf in her mouth. I started to shame her. Her stub of a tail was wagging and she looked guilty. She dropped the loaf which surprised the heck out of me. When I got back inside, the toast I had forgotten about was burned almost beyond recognition.

I got my new covid booster and a flu shot yesterday. I chose to have both in one arm. That arm is just a bit sore today. Next, I have to schedule my second pneumonia and my second shingles shots.

When I was I kid, I was playing with friends when I knocked the scab off my smallpox shot. It was on my leg. My doctor had said it was better than having a scar on my arm. I was afraid I’d need another shot. I didn’t. That scar stayed for years but has since disappeared.

Shots have never bothered me even when I was kid. I’ve seen people faint after getting a shot. Others got dizzy and put their heads between their legs to ward off fainting. Before I went to South America, my friend, my travel companion, and I went to Boston to get shots. They weren’t available here. I think we got three or four. She was a put her head between her legs shot taker. I just grimaced.

In Ghana, I was protected against just about everything. We got a yellow fever shot before we left the country. In Ghana, after a couple of days, we had shot day. I was okay with that as most of the diseases and such could be found in the region where I was going to live. I had never heard of half of the shots. We got typhus, diphtheria, tetanus, polio, gamma globulin and rabies, all in one day. The gamma globulin was every six months. A cholera epidemic broke out while I was there so we had that shot but later than the rest. We were supposed to take Aralen every week to ward off malaria, but we only took it during the rainy season. During the dry season, there were no bugs.

I guess I was well protected as I didn’t get any diseases. I did get the travelers’ disease, a race to the bathroom disease, but almost everybody gets that. I just made sure I was fast.