On The Mend...

Thanks to everyone for keeping my mom in their thoughts and prayers ! Your collective good wishes and her tenacity has gotten her through the worst of this. She was released from the hospital yesterday and is back home.

I was really worried when we arrived at the hospital Sunday around 3:30, after the ten hour trip up there. She was very frail and was having a hard time getting enough breath to "get under" the junk in her lungs that was making her cough. Her puny little coughs would continue until she could hardly catch her breath, which made us hold our breath as if to help give her more oxygen in the room with which to cough. She was also running a fever, as high as 104 degree at times, that would have her sweating big time. She said she was "fine" but she didn't look it.

When we arrived Monday morning, she looked totally different. They had put her on oxygen all night and that must have helped immensely because she looked like her old self. She was sitting on the side of the bed and although she still didn't have a big cough, they were coming much less frequently. We left there feeling much better about her making a full recovery. They also did a CT scan of her chest and everything looked fine...no cancer. There is still some infection in her lung but nothing else to be concerned about.

Here is the hospital where mom was....and yes, it's a hospital. Linda flatly refuted that when we pulled in the parking lot. "This isn't a hospital !" I said "It sure is...this is where Becky was born". It's Troy Community Hospital and was started by the man who was my doctor while growing up and delivered my daughter. Back when small town hospitals were failing, the government created Critical Care facilities in small towns where people would die before they could get to a city hospital. There are certain criteria that they have to meet but that is what this hospital became.

This hospital is across the street from where I had my bakery in the town of Troy, PA. We also lived up over the bakery, in downtown Troy. The delivery area and nursery for newborns used to be in the basement of the hospital. In the early morning hours of September 8th, I walked out the front door of the bakery as we were opening at 6 a.m. Told them I'd be back in a couple of days and then walked across the street to the hospital and Becky was born a little after 8 a.m. A couple days later we walked back home...Becky was one of the last babies born in the hospitals obstetrics area. I remember that they had a lot of the new mother gift packs there (diapers, wipes, etc.) and we got quite a few of them since they were closing the area. It was a nice starter kit.

The last time I had been to this hospital was to say goodbye to my dad in October of 1987. All of these good, bad and ugly memories were rolling through my head as we drove the ten hours to get there.

On Sunday evening we spent the night at my mom's house. On the drive there, we got to see the windmills and gas wells. All of the windmills were turning and the pipeline for the gas wells, near my mom's house, is being laid in trenches. All of the truck traffic over her road has completely pulverized the blacktop. It is now a dirt road until all of the construction is done and then, I presume, they will rebuild the roads. Wow, what a big project.

Called my mom this afternoon to see how she's feeling and she said good...."I cleaned the refrigerator and did some other odd jobs". I told her that she better take it easy and rest. She told me " They said I could resume my normal activities" and I told her "Well your normal activities would rival that of most 20 year olds". You can't keep a good Woman down....

Summary of the Week

I forgot to mention that on Tuesday morning we went to Denny's for their free breakfast. All the waitstaff had these t-shirts on which we thought were cute. The line, outside the restaurant, wasn't too long so we only had to wait about 15 minutes before we got in. The couple that was ahead of us in line was the same couple we had chatted with last year for this same event. Weird, huh ? Inside they were a lot more organized than they had been last year and we waited just a few minutes for our free Grand Slam. There was a balloon artist making neat animals out of balloons while people waited for their food. It was a fun event and hey, ya can't beat free food.

I mentioned in an earlier post about the cranes here in the park and the day after I put that post on,I realized my error in calling them whooping cranes because we went to the bird sanctuary and got to see Sand Hill cranes, like we have here, at their facility. Our friend Cindy let us know about the mistake...Anyway, there is one missing and I'm worried that something has happened to it. There is only one wandering around now...Don't know where the other one went to. Hoping nothing bad has happened. Is this the time of year for sitting on a nest or raising young ? Guess I need to study up on sand hill cranes.

Today we took our friend Jan to the hospital to get some blood work done. By the time she finished up there it was around noontime and since she had to fast for her test and we drove her to the hospital, none of us had eaten and we were starving. We went to Cinnamon Sticks and had breakfast. I had french toast stuffed with a strawberry cream cheese mixture. Very good ! We got our bellies full, got some propane and came on home.

In an earlier post I spoke of the windmills that are going up near my mom in Pennsylvania. Well, I heard on the news the other night that the new clean energy initiative (which I think is great) is not creating jobs in the US but that 80% of the money is going to companies overseas to build these products. Grrrrr......How is that going to create jobs here ? The news report said it was congress's fault because no specific provisions were put in the energy bill that the materials/jobs, etc. should be "American". Come On, Congress...get with it ! Isn't that the point of trying to jump start our economy and "create" jobs in our country....not send all our money to China so they can send the manpower and equipment back to us ? Duh !!

It's been chilly here...in the 50's. Tonight they are expecting 1-3" of snow through the panhandle area of Florida. Safe here...whew ! Friends and family up north are saying it's horrible up there. High winds and lots of snow. Oh no, I just heard where there is a possibility of ANOTHER storm next week for these same areas. And to think that Vancouver has had to truck snow in for the Olympics....they didn't have enough snow on the slopes. Hah...Maybe they need to move the Olympics to Maryland.

Energy Everywhere.....

As I mentioned in last night's post, Linda and I went for a drive with my mom so she could show us some things around the area. Turns out that there is a huge windmill project underway just over the hill from my mom's place. They are putting up something like 65 windmills on the ridge above route 6. How exciting !! Linda and I love seeing the windmills as we drive across the mid-west and now it will be in our own state of Pennsylvania (and our backyard). Mom said that they may actually add another 35 to this first batch. The power generated from these windmills is supposed to be enough to provide all the power needed for Tioga and Bradford county.

The other thing that Mom wanted to show us were the Marcellus Shale rigs all set up....extracting natural gas from the ground. This is a really big deal for Tioga and Bradford county and many people will become really wealthy as a result of it. Initially geologists didn't think that Marcellus Shale was going to yield great amounts of gas but they were wrong. Due to a new technology of vertical drilling and fracturing the rock, they are able to extract the gas AND it is yielding high volumes of gas. This is wonderful news for the northeast where highly populated cities will benefit. If you'd like to read more on this fascinating technology and promising energy source, go here. You'll find some great info and maps there. I'd love to see one of these wells close enough to my mom that she'd either get royalties from drilling nearby or money from the pipeline right of way.

I always knew there was something in the water.....Growing up on our farm next door, I always thought it odd that our tap water was flammable....yep, that's right you could light it on fire. First thing in the morning my mom could hold a match to the end of the faucet and the first time she'd turn it on, the water would ignite. Weird, huh ! A great party trick to impress your friends.