Maintenance, Maintenance, Maintenance

Maintenance, maintenance, maintenance. That's what life becomes more of the older you or your possessions get. Like I'm telling you something you don't already know.

Living out in the country presents its own set of problems. For the last week or two we have been trying not to notice the "rotten egg smell" that is present in our well water, but as much as we pretend that ignoring it will make it go away, we finally have to start making telephone calls.

Paul Olson, of Ken Olson Well, a very pleasant young man, came out yesterday and shocked the well with copious amounts of bleach poured directly into the well water. This morning Kim and I looked like the crew on a submarine that had just been damaged by a depth charge, shutting down pipes, draining faucets, twisting valves back on again.

Then to top it off, while I am mowing the now Pampas that used to be a "lawn" near the house, as I get near the cap of the septic system, I find standing water. Not a good sign as it means we have a back up down the line in our drain field. I can just hear the septic system guy's cash register -- Ka-Ching!

Ah, well, you can laugh or you can cry. Me? I scream very foul curse words for a couple of minutes which seems to calm me and turn me toward acceptance of the fact that what is -- well, IS. I am, however, not certain that the next door neighbors appreciate the fusillade of filth.

It's maintenance, maintnenace, maintenance.

Speaking of the older me, I gave Kim a good scare yesterday.

We have started to diet again (maintenance) as I can no longer conjoin my 34's at the waist and my 36's are even uncomfortable when I sit, so my daily routine has become coffee and an English muffin for breakfast, fight through the psychology of it's noon so you MUST eat, and then eat an early supper (that's country-speak for dinner) about 4:30PM.

This puts us among the senior citizen "early birds" but hey -- swallow your pride.

So we are running a few errands in Kim's hybrid Prius and just as we are nearing Putnam Heights Drugs, I get a terrific pain across the top, lower part of my chest. I mean, its a dandy! And it won't go away.

Of course, with my past coronary history you know what we are worrying about so after the drug store we head for urgent care. I am now convinced that I am gong to miss supper entirely as I will be sent to the hospital overnight for observation.

The doc comes in and decides they need blood to check on the heart and take x-rays to check on the digestive system. I had some fun with the x-ray tech, a short, fireball of a gal, who comes in and loudly says: "Take off your pants -- and put on these paper shorts!"

so I yell back at her: "Do ya want me to take off my pants?! Why don't you take 'em off for me?!" Another nurse pokes her head in the room to ask what's going on .

By the time they have the blood and the x-rays in the lab, it's turning the corner on 8:30PM, and we are both getting peckish. Thinking that it won't take long on the tests, I foolishly call in an order for a pizza at Sammy's.

8:50PM and still no doctor with results. I call Sammy's and ask if they have already put the pie in the oven. Yes they have. I tell them we are hung up at urgent care and that when and if we finally get out, I will call an order another one and pay for them both.

Doctor comes in about 8:55 to tell me that tests are all negative, heart is fine. Digestive shows a lot of gas.

I have never had that kind of digestsive distress before. But I'll take it over a heart attack any day.

I think it was the too- green banana I ate about 2:30 PM.

We had a great waitress at Sammy's. Insisted that we didn't have to pay for the first pizza I ordered, then brought it to us boxed as we were getting ready to leave. There goes the diet!

We left her a $10 tip.