Pima Air and Space Museum

Bruce and I are spending two months, at least, in Tucson AZ. We found an RV Resort with all sorts of activities. Bruce is in the lapidary shop and I've been quilting. I joined the Zumba group and we've been hiking in beautiful parks with the hiking group. There are lots of points of interest in and around Tucson. On Wednesday we visited the "boneyard" and the Pima Air and Space Museum. We spent just about all day exploring. Yesterday, we hiked up to Hutch's Pool in Sabino Canyon. Beautiful!!!

More photos of Newfoundland

Newfoundland...me love

Since Bruce and I sold our house, we decided to spend the summer in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia.  We spent the weekend of June 14th, celebrating my sister's 50th birthday, in Keene NY  It was a mini family reunion. On June 18th we meandered our way to Sydney, Nova Scotia, to catch the ferry to Newfoundland. It is a six hour crossing to Port aux Basques, NL. Once on land we drove to our first campground. JT Cheesemen Provincial Park. Bruce hooked us up and I started dinner. Out of the blue, I got horrendous gas pains that got progressively worse. I started throwing up until nothing was left to throw up but my body insisted on trying. I thought it could be food poisoning from the roast beef sandwich we had shared on the ferry, but Bruce had zero symptoms. I usually don't go to the doctor or hospital until on my death bed, so I guess I felt close enough to go. Bruce brought me to the hospital in Port aux Basques. Who should greet me but the one and only doctor from Brooklyn. He called me the lady from NY. Here I was put on an iv drip that took them three pokes to get into a dehydrated vein. They gave me morphine and something to stop the nausea. On a scale from one to ten, I thought the pain was a ten. A lab technician was called in just as she was about to go to bed, to get blood work from me and someone else. I spent the night here and the next day had a chest x- ray. That was fine and was told I need to have a CAT scan, which they don't have. I would have to take a two hour ambulance ride to the town of Corner Brook. We were warned of the expense and I asked the doctor if we could drive up. " I wouldn't suggest that". I imagined thousands of dollars and when the cost was under that, it was a relief. The administration was afraid to tell us! LOL!! The NY doctor also wanted me to see a surgeon. Bruce wasn't comfortable with this hospital because there was only one doctor, and said we weren't going back. At two o'clock the best ambulance crew in Newfoundland ( and they even said so) took me for the two hour ride over bumpy Newfoundland roads. They apologized and said it doesn't get better. It did hurt now and again, but that morphine is a wonder. On the way up Mark gave me a water tower size container of liquid to drink for the dye used with a CAT scan. I hoped I could hold it down. I managed to drink what was needed. At one point the sirens went off and we went sailing through road construction. I thought Keith would be so jealous, I got a ride in an ambulance. With the SIRENS blaring!!! So Mark took a picture of me and emailed it to me. It's not pretty but fun to have. Darn, Keith was in an ambulance a few years back after getting hit by a car. When I arrived at Western Memorial in Corner Brook I was under the CAT scan ten minutes after arriving. The surgeon then examined me. She gave me a rectal exam and that pain is a ten and the cramps have moved down to a seven. She said I have a UTI. I had no idea. They changed the iv because the vein blew out. Which is common. More blood work and waiting for CAT scan results. They decided to control my nausea, they would put a tube up my nose down my throat into my stomach to suck out the stuff. Instant relief. But the pain of shoving a tube up the nostril is now my new number ten and the rectal exam is an eight. The results of the CAT scan showed I had a partially blocked lower intestine. She felt that the tubular litigation I had thirty years ago stuck to the intestine and caused a kink.(adhesion) They also saw fibroids, which I've known I've had for years. Because of this I was to see a gynecologist. The Gynecologist came and asked questions and found nothing unusual in my history and didn't think the two were related. The intestine just moved next to scar tissue from the previous procedure. She still wanted to check the endometriosis. This involved inserting an instrument with a razor on it and running it along my uterus. This pain was rated ten because it was the longest two minutes of pain I ever experienced and I cried. The nose tube is now a nine. The one procedure they wanted to do on Tuesday was to tap my stomach to see what the fluid was. Since everything is improving, my iv is out, my nose tube is out, and I am now on solid liquid diet ( i wasn't allowed to eat for days) I may not have to. The surgeon gave me exercises to make the kink go back to normal. She said the kink is like a garden hose. The nurses here are so sweet and the surgeon is down to earth and seems to know her stuff. I just hope never to have a relapse. This is the first emergency visit I've ever had to a hospital. Hopefully, I will be released on Tuesday if not sooner. My roommate is Monna and she is a moaner for sure. After being with her for a week she is finally speaking English to us and the staff. I feel well enough now that I put her socks on and got her water. It wasn't cold enough so I got the nurse to do it. LOL!! She pouts a lot. All is well now and after touring NL for six weeks we are getting ready to take the ferry back to Nova Scotia, so we can explore there.  We planned on taking the ferry back from St. John's on the east coast, which is a 14 hr ferry.  During this past week a ferry on the west coast became grounded.  They took the ferry from the east coast to the west coast to help ferry to Nova Scotia.  So now we have to drive back west to catch the ferry. 

We've been in Newfoundland for six weeks and saw a lot of interesting things.  It really is very pret ty here and so peaceful.  The people are so friendly!!

River at Cindy and Pat's House

 

 

 

 

 

 

We saw a couple of moose and ate a mooseburger

Albert Einstein:

On the road again!!

August 30, 2012

Our last evening in Ithaca was a pleasant one and a great way to end our summer at home.  After  a day of packing up a snow mobile trailer and the back of the car, we had dinner with our friends at their Cayuga Lake house.  We decided to leave the coach in Ithaca this season because next summer we want to go to Nova Scotia and Newfoundland CA.  Why spend a bazillion dollars on fuel to go west and then return east, when we have our Candominium in Tucson.

August 31, 2012

This morning we jammed a few last minute things in our car and headed to Greensburg PA to visit Bruce's mom and sister.  We had a nice time catching up and it was good to see our brother in law who had been quite ill, on the mend and doing well.  I also collected a few more things that might
come in handy at our Candominium in Tucson.

Sept.1, 2012

Today we had the luck of the Irish and we aren't even Irish!!  It did cost us four hundred dollars though.  After leaving Greensburg, we weren't gone thirty minutes and one of the brand new tires on the trailer blew out.  Bruce changed to a spare we had and luckily there was a tire store about six miles away and we were able to get a new tire.  So on the road again we went.  It was getting to be dinner time so we decided we would stop at the next tourist/ rest area to see if we could find a place to stay and have dinner.  The first one came too soon so we continued on to the next one, fiftyfour miles away, in Bristol TN.  It was a good thing we stopped.  When we got out we could smell
something hot.  Bruce checked under the trailer and a spring on the trailer broke and the tire was
wearing a hole in the bed of the trailer and the trailer bed was wearing the tire away.  We decided if
we wanted to sleep at night and get to Georgia we would need to get a Uhaul trailer.  Besides that the trailer was not going to make it in one piece anyway.  We found a Uhaul store four miles away across the state line in Bristol VA. The owner was just closing for the day but came and led us to his store the long way so that the tire wouldn't blow again on the major highway.  Would you believe there was a Uhaul trailer with a picture of San Xavier de Bac Mission which is around the corner from our resort in Tucson!!  It was just waiting for us to bring it home.  The owner of the family owned Uhaul company was so very helpful.  He gave us water and told the story of his father and the shop.  Not to mention helping Bruce and me shove our mattress in the back of the trailer. Two hours later he got to go home and we found a hotel and had some dinner.

Sept.2, 2012

Today was uneventful.  We are in Young Harris, Georgia at William Holland School of Lapidary Arts.  We'll be here for a week.  Bruce is taking a class on advanced glass fusion and I am taking a class in bead crochet and Kumi himo.  It's fun here.  Camp for retired people, but every now and then a young adult takes a class. 

The Green Flash

The reason for green flash optical phenomena lies in refraction of light (as in a prism) in the atmosphere: light moves more slowly in the lower, denser air than in the thinner air above, so sunlight rays follow paths that curve slightly, in the same direction as the curvature of the Earth. Higher frequency light (green/blue) curves more than lower frequency light (red/orange), so green/blue rays from the upper rim of the setting sun remain visible after the red rays are obstructed by the curvature of the earth.
Green flashes are enhanced by mirage, which increase the density gradient in the atmosphere and therefore, increase refraction. A green flash is more likely to be seen in clear air, when more of the light from the setting sun reaches the observer without being scattered. One might expect to see a blue flash, but the blue is preferentially scattered out of the line of sight, and remaining light ends up looking green.
With slight magnification a green rim on the top of the solar disk may be seen on most clear-day sunsets, although the flash or ray effects require a stronger layering of the atmosphere and a mirage, which serves to magnify the green for a fraction of a second to a couple of seconds.


Bruce and I are at Venice Beach California. We are taking a cruise through the Panama Canal that leaves south of here. Tonight we watched the sun set at the beach on the Pacific Ocean and saw the green flash. We've seen the flash several times when we lived aboard Arcadia. When a sailor sees the green flash it means safe travels for him. It is amazing and exciting to see this phenomena. We should have safe travels on our cruise.