Blood test results

Expect trouble as an inevitable part of life and repeat to yourself the most comforting words of all: this too shall pass. —Ann Landers, newspaper columnist (1918–2002)


In other words there is always hope. Things will get better, if we can't physically make something better we can change our attitude to it and it will still be better.
Talking about things changing and improving, I had another blood test yesterday and the results were great. White cells are in normal range now, platelets are well up and liver enzymes are much improved with ALT slightly above normal and the AST in normal range. As my sister Paula said "Awesome!!!" I am very happy as it puts me in good shape for the liver treatment in Frankfurt next week. Feel much less nervous about going and feel heartened by the improvement. Have certainly been working at it with Glen making me three large vegetable juices a day including a green juice (swamp water). Also watching the diet generally, keeping alkaline and also exercising which is supposed to very helpful for increasing white cell counts.

Walked for an hour this morning. We were up a bit earlier and it was a nice temperature for walking when we left at 6:30am, also the sun wasn't up over the hill for the first 20 minutes or so of the walk. Kept a close eye out for snakes but didn't see any. Never get sick of the countryside here, it's just beautiful.

The panorama and the variety of flora is amazing. That is the Sonoran Desert, one of the most species rich deserts of North America. Many of the deserts are mostly sand and rock with little vegetation and therefore also little fauna. The Sonoran Desert stretches across southern Arizona and California and deep into Western Mexico. In the US it's lushest portions are found in Arizona, where violent summer thunderstorms produce spectacular lightening displays and nourish a wide range of subtropical vegetation. Animals take advantage of the diversity for shelter and food. This summer we have seen the thunderstorms but we have not had much of the l heavy downpours usually associated with them. So it is very dry here, well dryer even than usual.

We have seen a few new bits of wildlife. A small lizard, a Western Banded Gecko, which is normally nocturnal but turned up in the house during the day. Very pretty little animal. It seems the only Gecko to reside in this area. There are huge numbers of lizards here, unfortunately they are very shy and very quick so don't get a close look and certainly hard to take a photo. Many of them are from the Iguana family and they look very prehistoric. There are other more skink like looking lizards as well.

Insects are less obvious, get moths at night, lots of ants, Velvet Ants, which are actually wasps and some huge beetles that we thought were small bats at first. We changed our minds when they started flying at us and we ran screaming inside. We also had a Desert Tarantula on the front patio. Unfortunately it was dead but it gave us a good opportunity to inspect it thoroughly. They are nocturnal as well and are more common late August to October. During the day they hide in deep, silk lined burrows. Wow are they big. They grow to about 8 cm.
Fortunately there don't seem to be any scorpions about. My sister's last house 20 or so miles from here had quite a lot of them inside the house as well as outside. They give a very painful bite so I am glad they don't seem to be hanging around here.

Not as much happening around the bird bath at the moment as there has been a lot of human activity. Yesterday huge cement trucks and pumps were there busy pumping cement into the pool. Today there is a lot of quad and trailer work as supplies are moved to the fence line which Jonathan (with some help) is putting up. This will get some snake netting at the bottom and then the dogs will be able to go out whenever they like through the dog door and the pool will be safely behind a fence as well, not that there are many people wandering around out there. Kona likes to swim and it will be good for her rehabilitation post cruciate surgery. The pool will be finished probably by the end of next week and we are looking forward to being able to swim when we get back from Germany.


Tomorrow we are planning to go to Jerome up at higher altitude. It's an old mining town near Sedona. More about that when we get back.

Surviving and thriving

Linda