I just had Charlie out for an aborted walk. Even he is tired of our very cool weather and wanted to turn for home after barely getting started. He didn't have to ask me twice. I don't mind the cool temps (39ºf / 4ºc) as much as I mind the stiff wind. For all of my unhappiness with the weather, I haven't allowed it to slow my roll too much. I've managed to golf 4 times in the past 8 days. There's a benefit to this cool weather if you don't mind being out in it. I golfed 18 holes yesterday in 2 hours and 36 minutes! A typical round of golf is closer to 4 hours but there was nobody in front of me to slow me down. It's been nice to be on the links again.
I had my 6-month checkup with my dermatologist a couple of weeks ago. She sent off two samples of blemishes, one from each calf, to be evaluated for cancer. One of the areas came back positive for basal cell skin cancer and the other came back positive for squamous cell skin cancer. They're both very treatable. I've had areas biopsied before but they've all been benign. I have an appointment in a few weeks to have both areas excised of the remaining cancer cells. What I'm a little worried about though is that the areas will heal before I return for my follow-up treatment, making it difficult for my doctor to find the correct area again to treat it. I'm thinking of keeping them circled in ink so we're sure where they're at. It's probably overkill but it's the way my mind works.
My guilty pleasure lately has been a program on TLC called
Return to Amish which is about an extended Amish family in Pennsylvania. The show follows the lives of several family members, some who choose to leave the Amish lifestyle and others who decide to remain. What I find so interesting are the many storylines that weave their way through the episodes. But also, what is so clearly evident are the family ties that bind them, even through all of the hardships the church places on them as it requires they make a choice between family members who have left the church and the church itself. Once a member has chosen to leave the church they're shunned by those who remain. If someone is found to be associating with shunned members, possibly your own children or siblings, they too are shunned. The show is much more than that, though. I'm just starting season 3 of 7.
Tammy showed me a Facebook post a few days ago from
Farmington Health Services, Trinity Campus where her mother lived out the final years of her life. They're looking for volunteers to pilot bicycle rides for residents of their retirement home. It's the kind of volunteering opportunity I've been hoping for. I stopped by yesterday to speak with some of the staff there and to talk about the program. They have two bikes: the one in the photo to the right which can carry two passengers and another bike that serves as a platform for a wheelchair-bound person. I don't know how easy it will be to talk with my passengers while we're riding but I'm hoping I'll be able to listen to them tell me stories about their lives as we cycle through the neighborhood streets. I'm excited to get started just as soon as the weather allows. If anyone reading this would also like to volunteer for this program, they would love to have you.
This week, FOX News agreed to pay Dominion Voting Services $787.5 million to settle a
defamation lawsuit just as the trial was to begin. I was glad for Dominion but disappointed that the case didn't result in any of FOX's television hosts having to testify in court about their on-air support of lies by guests that they clearly knew weren't being honest. And unless their viewers ever left the comfort of the disgraced network for news, they likely never even knew that there was a lawsuit against them. With the exception of (I think) two small mentions, the network was silent about the matter.
FOX still has
one more pending defamation suit against them from Smartmatic USA to the tune of $2.7 billion. These cases are why I continue to harp on conservative media as they lie to their viewers and irresponsibly divide our nation for monetary gain.
That's all I've got.
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