WWQP Bulletin Board Chat

COUNTRY LIVING

ROSEY, reading your post made me think of a crack a woman made when I said that Al and I were retiring to the Sylva area and she was positively horrified. She said something to the effect of "What in the world will you do for the rest of your life!!" Well, I'll tell you what I don't do. I don't sit in traffic jams unless there is an accident ahead, I don't hear traffic noises all night, I don't lock my house most of the time except for nighttime, I don't have to listen to my neighbor's dog yapping under my bedroom window at 2 AM, I don't walk out on a dark night unable to determine if it's cloudy or clear, never seeing star or planet because of light pollution and able to listen to the night critters, especially the tree frogs in the summer and spring peepers in spring. The neighbors who don't crowd me pitch right in when I need help without being bidden. I don't need to plant flowers because Mother Nature provides me with the most botanically diverse area in the temperate zone, I don't need to confine my dog in a pen or at the end of a rope as she can come and go through the dog door as we are far enough from any road and she isn't inclined to wander. I have all the social life I want through quilting activities and volunteer stuff. Taxes are relatively low too. Of course I don't have kids in school here because the schools are fairly poor compared to what my grands have available. Everywhere I have occasion to go I drive through some of the most beautiful views I've ever seen.

I share your concern about having to give up living this way if I live long enough and I'm doing everything I can to keep my brain and body functioning. Right now with the Area Agency of Aging (7 western counties in NC) we are trying to educate the state legislators who are caught in rapidly declining revenues and trying to avoid California's fate, are struggling to get control of the budget, that the cost of providing home care support including respite and other support for care givers in the long run is far, far cheaper than paying to place the folks who can't fend for themselves along in assisted living and nursing homes. NC constitution requires a balanced budget thank goodness so everyone needs to tighten the belt. I've got to get the names and addresses of the federal congressmen and senators working on medical "reform". Instead of meddling in dr./pt. relationships they need to take a hard look at the numbers and realize that the aforementioned need for home care will save millions on medicaid. Now that we old folks don't have the sense to lie down and die we are outnumbering the folks who pay into Social Security and Medicare. DUH! If Bernie Madoff ran a Ponzy scheme he must have learned from the federal government only he didn't have the power to force people to invest. Oh well, I don't want to start a debate. I have more ideas on the issue but I haven't seen any requests so I'll shut up.

On the happy side, I feel good today and have errands to run before I hit the sewing machine. Shadow is now on a kidney friendly diet. When I took her in for a teeth cleaning she flunked the blood work done on old dogs before anesthesia. There's absolutely no sign of infection which would be easy with antibiotics. Vet is quite sure it is a matter of aging (she'll be 13 on 6/30) which requires a significant drop in protein and increase in carbs and fats. Of course she wouldn't touch the special prescribed dog food ($27/10lbs) even with chicken broth and bits of white meat chicken. She is amazingly adept at slurping up the broth and bits of chicken and leaving behind the hated food. I finally tasted it after it absorbed broth and it tastes like chicken. If it were the only thing available and I were hungry enough it wasn't all that bad. Anyway, I am now making her dog food which is messy, multi ingredient pain in the tush and she loves it! It contains browned ground beef (the cheapest fattest kind) white rice (I only eat brown) white bread (I only eat whole wheat) hard boiled egg and a very small amount of calcium carbonate. If anyone has a hint, that is if you haven't all glazed over and scrolled on) about how to convert tablets to powder so I can add the 1/4 teaspoon the recipe calls for I'd love to hear from you. I'll try the food processor.

Another thought on growing old: GET A PET!

Jane, getting off her soap box and heading to the weekly pet adoption place in Sylva to donate the 30 lbs of senior Pro Plan dog food I'd purchased just before the kidney fiasco.

posted by Jane in NC @ 6:55 AM