Say What?

I posted this to my Facebook wall on Saturday morning: I think I may have just had my best night's sleep ever! I've been missing that feeling for most of my adult life. Of all of the benefits of being retired, getting adequate sleep is the one that matters most to me. I lived on not much more than 5 hours of sleep each night when I was working, oftentimes less and although I made it work, it couldn't have been good for me. I'm averaging around 8 hours of sleep each night now with an occasional afternoon nap and it feels so good. What's most noticeable about my sleep-filled nights are the dreams I'm having. They're bizarre and so full of detail and usually bear little resemblance to my real life. I go to bed each night wondering where they'll take me. As reluctant as I was, it's nice to have stepped off the treadmill that was my career. Sometimes I'll think about the current day of the week and imagine how rushed I'd be if I was still in m...

I was back at my dermatologist's office last Friday for another round of Photodynamic Therapy as a defense against Mr. Sun. I was treated twice last year with the same PDT treatment and it worked well. My doctor hasn't said but I believe he wants to treat me routinely with this method for destroying precancerous skin cells (also known as actinic keratoses) on my face. While I was very good at using sunscreen last year during the summer and fall, I stopped once winter arrived and I shouldn't have. I've got my bottle of Blue Lizard Australian Sunscreen (with zinc) at the ready once again. My vascular doctor (who became involved with my health care a little over a year ago) has become my primary care physician. He had me in for a physical last November and did a complete blood count on me to check for the dozens of values a blood panel measures. While my HDL cholesterol level was optimal (68), my LDL (125) and overall cholesterol (211) were both higher than Dr. Foley...

I read a story recently about an overweight guy who is bicycling across the country to both win his wife back and lose weight while paying for his adventure via crowdsourcing. I had no reason to suspect his effort to be anything other than a legitimate endeavor but Tammy was watching Dr. Phil today and he was interviewing Eric on his program. Apparently, Eric has more than a few skeptics, and for good reason. I was looking at his Strava page (Strava is what a lot of us cyclists use to track our progress) and Eric is spending very little time trying to reach his goal but he still has his hand out looking for whatever money people will throw his way. Crowdsourcing is one way to generate income online—making viral videos is another. A friend posted a video on Facebook today of a guy walking the streets of NYC with dozens of dollar bills taped to his suit while holding a sign that encouraged passersby in need to take whatever amount of money they wanted off of him. I had no reason t...

Each morning when I wake up I reach for my phone to check for notifications or emails. One of the things I enjoy seeing most is my "look back" from Facebook that shows me what I was doing on that day's date in previous years. If nothing else, it shows me how fast a year or more can get away but it also usually provides for some nice memories. As someone who likes to reminisce about days gone by, this works well for me. Yesterday's look back had a photo of our pups that I'd posted 7 years ago just after Charlie had come to live with us. I had written in the comments section: "Toby is becoming more and more accepting of Charlie all the time. Charlie follows Toby like he's a big brother at the dog park. It's very cute to watch." I remember those days. It would take Toby at least a couple of years to warm up to the little guy but he eventually did. They're not playmates but they can often be found snuggled close together. I took the photo to...