Author: Bill

Greetings family, friends and neighbors. Been a hot minute since I have been on here and figured I’d better get something up here. After tomorrow I am going to [supposed to be] slammed. Been a ‘different‘ past 4 days or so. As most of you know (I am presuming here) that my Queen is now back in the land of plenty. Everything kind of fell into place to send her back a couple of days ago and we moved forward with it. She got to spend Christmas with our babies and Grand babies and she is there now nice and close to decent medical care to address her health issues that we need to get resolved. I couldn’t see going back for that amount of time. While I love my family, spending that much time in that climate would have driven me over the edge. So I opted to stay here and hold the fort down and let Angie enjoy some family time without me upsetting her (grumpy old fart that I am)  😉   First time in 46 years I have spent Christmas by myself…. oddly, it wasn’t near as tough this time as the last. Last time I was 19 years old and stationed out in Nevada. Guess I’ve seasoned a little bit since then. LOL. I had my moments, especially Christmas morning, but face time helped a lot as I got to see [and hear] everybody via the good old mobile phone….. technology~~ Afterwards I did okay. The dives that were scheduled for Christmas day were cancelled, so I stayed busy making a run to the grocery store and then mowing the yard. Heckva a Christmas day activity. That’s the other thing…… that particular holiday just don’t ‘seem‘ like that holiday when it’s 86° and you’re sweating profusely. I also found other things to keep my mind occupied, so the rest of my day wasn’t bad.

Diving got cancelled for today as well [[Dammit Emmit]] and after I got house maintenance done, I committed to learning more about my new editing system. I made myself sit down and sat through about 5 hours of tutorials, with the occasional break to get up and walk around and get some blood back in my touchas. Not how I want to spend my time, but it was really worth it. I have such a much better understanding of it now and actually look forward to using it <tomorrow>. Speaking of which (if there are no more cancellations) I have a very busy week after tomorrow. I have one boat tomorrow (2 dives) and then Wednesday & Thursday I have two boats (2 dives each boat) each day. That won’t put me back here until probably 5:30ish….. so I’ll be editing pictures right up until bed time each night, so you probably won’t see or hear from me [here] those two nights….. even with my new found knowledge of Photo Shop. Never fear….. I’m doing great here all by my lonesome and I’ll get back on here ASAP. I hope each and everyone of you had a very Merry Christmas~!

Good Night Y’all : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : Thankx for stopping in~!

Up this morning after a very casual start to the day. My Bride was up shortly behind me and we took it easy as the day wore on. She was [obviously] feeling soooo much better. She even went ‘out and about‘ yesterday to get some last minute items before her impending departure and did well. She made us a most wonderfully delicious breakfast before she started packing. She was feeling a little depressed as she packed, knowing I was not going to be there with her. She bravely fought back tears as it came time to load her into the truck and take her to the airport. I reminded her how she was going to be surrounded by [most] of our Daughters and all of our Grand babies, which seemed to help. I think the thought of arriving in front of an impending blizzard didn’t help, but whadda ya gonna do ?? I got her to the airport, checked in and made sure arrangements in Atlanta were in place. A long hug and multiple kisses before she headed into the restricted area (for me) and headed into customs. I reminded her I was a mere 20 minutes if something went South.

I stopped at the store and picked up a couple of items that I was gonna need and headed back to the house. Weird feeling….. I guess knowing she is not going to come stumbling out of the bedroom in an hour or so. I [usually] relish my time alone, but this just didn’t seem right. I’m sure she is having the same thoughts, but I take solace in the fact she is going to be up to her neck in love with the girls and Grand babies around her. I also secretly think she really wanted to be back in the states for Christmas, although she would never admit it out loud. For that, I am happy we went through with sending her back. I am also greatly relieved that she is now going to get the medical care she needs. That worried more than anything. She has made a dandy recovery from her pneumonia, but I want to get the other issues resolved and this trip should do it. At least I know she will not be subjected again to the horrid condition’s of our embarrassingly nasty ER here.

As for me…. I have straightened up the house, confirmed I am diving tomorrow, even though it is a private charter, so I have all my batteries on charge right now. I have made me a drink (or two) and listening to the music channel on TV and the whir of the floor fan. As much as I look forward to “Baching” it for the next couple of weeks, when you have spent as much time together as we have, it’s just different…… We’ll both be okay, just may take a day ‘or so’ to get accustom to it. Angie will use our family to deal with it…… me, I’m gonna dive ‘my brains out’.

Good Night Y’all – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – Thankx for stopping in~!

Happy Anniversary to our ‘Damn’ Neighbors~!

Another fairly early morning mainly because my belly was growling, so I went ahead and got up. Wasn’t up very long before my Queen came stumbling out. She wasn’t out very long before heading back to bed. She got up after an hour or so complaining that she thought she had a fever. She took a Tylenol and drank a little water. I made her an ice pack and she went back to bed. I left the door to the bedroom open for better airflow through the room and help keeping it cooler, which meant I had to be a little quieter than usual. So- I sat here at the computer most of the day watching videos with the exception of answering (entirely too many) phone calls, which means I had to grab the phone and run out onto the porch so I wouldn’t wake Angie up. Not a fun or exciting day, but it needed done. Angie napped for a little over 5 hours this time. She just got up not to long ago. She’s had a shower and two bowls of Cheerios~! She says she feels sooo much better (and looks it too). She is now chatting with Rachael [and dragging me into it~!] and I’m trying to get this done, which is getting tougher by the minute~!!!

Neighbors came by last night and by the time they went back home, it was just late enough and I got far enough out of the mood to do anything – I just closed my laptop and sat down and enjoyed a whole bunch of Gordon Ramsey with my Queen, which is why I missed last night…… so blame the neighbors.  😉

Good Night Y’all ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ Thankx for stopping in~!

Up much, much earlier than I wanted to be this morning but didn’t really have any decent options. I enjoyed the cool morning quiet until my Queen finally came stumbling out. After bathroom stuff and a breathing treatment she came out to join me at the table. She is looking slightly better, getting some color back in her face. She said she wasn’t hungry and I didn’t press the issue. She asked me to run up to the Post Office to mail something for her and although I would rather have had my tongue branded than do that – I gathered up the stuff she wanted mailed and took off. You have to understand our Post Office and the fine government employees that work up there. To start with, due to the phenomenal lack of parking, I had to park about a block away. There were approximately 35 – 40 people in that very small post office all waiting for goodies (that appeared to be mostly from Amazon). Without going into a lot of painful details….. it took me right an hour to get my Queen’s stuff mailed, but I finally got it and scrambled back to the house. Angie was already back in bed by the time I got back and didn’t make another appearance until almost 2:00. Again – that’s a good thing for her to sleep that much. Small steps, but everyday she is getting a little bit better. That makes me a little more relieved as she gets closer to her fly date. I don’t know if I went into a lot of details, but I am flying her back to the states on Wednesday. I got a plane ticket for a crazy low price for this particular day, compliments of an observant Daughter. The primary reason to get her back was to get her started with a pulmonologist but being there with all the kids and Grand babies for Christmas will be a big plus too. So, that is just another reason I want her good and healed up before she takes off. She did request something to eat. I made that for her and happy to see she finished all of it~! Now she is sitting across from me playing her game on her iPad. I’m sure she will move to the couch soon for at least one sappy Hallmark movie before I join her for some Hell’s Kitchen.

I tried to get on here last night, but our illustrious internet was acting hinky and wouldn’t load this site, so I just quit and went and sat down on the couch. Nothing in particular planned for tomorrow [yet] except taking care of my Queen.

Good Night Y’all / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / Thankx for stopping in~~!

Up again and getting ready for another day of tending to my Queen. She slept in a little bit this morning but not near as much as the day previous. I did manage to get her to eat a little bit but she still didn’t look as ‘perky‘ as she did the day before and by 11:00 convinced her to go back to bed. She went without argument and thankfully slept for almost 4 hours. Back up, she has some color to her face now and seems in much better spirits. The neighbors stopped in for a quick visit to check on her and chat a little bit. As I look at her now, I think I need to shuffle her over to the couch for a Hallmark movie and hopefully get her tired enough to head back to bed.

Neighbor wants to use my truck tomorrow, so I may hitch a ride with him and go and pick up Angie’s car. Long ugly story going on with that piece of crap, but I need to get it back here to the house and that would be the opportune way to do it so I don’t have to make Angie go anywhere. Her car has already costs us waay more than it’s worth. Depending on how much longer I think we’re gonna be here, I may try and sell it before I have to sink much more money into it. Always friggin’ something…….. we’ll see what tomorrow brings I guess.

Good Night Y’all : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : Thankx for stopping in~!

Happy to say my Queen slept mostly soundly through the night and even slept in a couple of extra hours this morning. I got her to eat a little bit and kept her as sedentary as I could. She is now on her perch on the couch getting her fill of sappy Hallmark Christmas movies. Small improvement in her overall….. one day at a time.

I went on a rampage to get rid of the go-zillion tiny pi$$ ants that we have been invaded with. Spraying them only seem to encourage them, so I took to emptying cabinets, vacuuming, wiping and spraying. I think [hope] I may have found their source of attraction in a packet of mix used for water (think Crystal Light) and an opened bag of Werther’s caramels. I rushed them to the sink and tried furiously to drown the little beggars and think I got most of them. Everything is cleaned up and put back in the cabinet (except the 2 ‘sources’). Garbage has been bagged up and taken out to the truck. Sure hope that does it and even though I went outside and shook off and wiped down I can still feel a couple of them tiny crawlers scrambling around inside my shirt and shorts. AAahh  – Island Life. Have to see what tomorrow brings. Right now I’m gonna go get a shower and get rid of the remaining couple of tiny travelers on me  😉

Good Night Y’all – – – – – – – – – – – – – – Thankx for stopping in~!

Wow, wow, wow…….WOW~! What a week. I should have looked at my last post and see where I left off, but I didn’t and just too tired to…… I am going to presume most of you know my Bride has been under the weather. As it turns out… that is putting it mildly. She has been all over the place, feeling good and feeling bad. She spent two days in a row mostly sleeping (which is a really good thing) she had a ‘better’ day after that and then went back to feeling poorly. Yesterday we decided she needed to go to the clinic. Good call. We spent a couple of hours in the clinic, where Angie had several breathing treatments and an X-Ray. After several tests it was determined she has pneumonia. Crap~! She has a little bit of water in one lung and the other lung has *?**?**?**?**?** (top of the lung has folded over a little bit). Doc’s weren’t overly concerned with either issue, saying with the right treatment she will be fit as fiddle in “no time”. With that being said, they directed us to the Emergency Room at the local hospital. I’m going to digress here a minute and comment on our local hospital. I have only been in there one other time and that was for a blood test and to pick up some documents. Now I have to tell you— I have heard multiple “horror” stories of our hospital. From what I saw….. they are all accurate. OMG – Our Emergency Room looks like something off of the set of Hill Street Blues. Pathetic is the first word that comes to mind. Ancient outdated [empty] cabinets in nasty dis-repair, worn faded paint on the walls, the rails of the beds (IF it had rails) were covered in rust. Pretty sure none of the floors have seen any wax since the 90’s. The admin office looked like something you see under a bridge in San Francisco. Now granted, comparing it to anything in the states (which is all I can do) may not be fair……. but it sure does not instill a sense of  comfort or security…. wow~! Anyhow — the nurses and the ‘Doc’ were all personable and seemed like they were proficient (bar the one nurse that could not get a needle into Angie’s arm) in what they were doing. They [finally] took multiple blood samples, gave Angie another breathing treatment and then held her for several more hours to ensure she was responding to the medications she had been given and that her temperature had come down to a safe level. Long night, not getting back to the house until close to 11:00PM. I got her settled and happy to report she had a pretty decent nights sleep. Today she seemed almost like her ‘old self’…. to the point where I “chastised” her for trying to do do much today and I think I have her convinced to keep her narrow little ass touchas on the couch and take it easy. We’ll see. I have stopped diving until I’m comfortable leaving her alone for more than hour or so. Today I got laundry done, grocery shopping (so we are now stocked back up) and the yard mowed. Tomorrow we are both gonna take it easy. Sorry for missing writing so much~!

Good Night Ya’ll + + + + + + + + + + + Thankx for stopping in~!

My Bride spent another fitful night feeling poorly and the better part of the day in bed again today (all day yesterday sleeping) getting up periodically to use the bathroom and trying to eat a little bit. I’m out of my mind happy that after the last time she got up this afternoon, I think her ‘bug’ had finally broke and she was feeling much, much better. Huge improvement over the past couple of days. We started talking about the other things we need to get fixed on her (lungs) and in true island fashion, found out that it would be mid to late February before we could get her to see a Pulmonologist over on St. Thomas. Unacceptable~! After many phone calls, we got her an appointment back in the states for early January, which is apparently the best we’re gonna get, with the holiday and all coming up. The opportunity to get her back there at a greatly reduced amount came up for the 21st of this month and she is going to take it. I got her a one way ticket for now, so she will have all the time she needs to spend seeing doctors and whomever she needs to see to get her healed up. Sadly, for multiple reasons…. I will not be coming back with her. I hate it and am not looking forward to it, but it needs to be done, sooner than later. So…  while she is doing much better now getting over her ‘bug’….. still lots of work to be done to get her back to where she needs to be. In the mean time – I’m gonna hang out here and hold down the Caribbean fort.

She convinced me that she feels good enough now, that I don’t feel bad leaving her unattended and can resume diving. I’m not only gonna resume diving…. I’m starting off doing 2 boats tomorrow. One of them being one of our “JR Dive” boats, where we get swamped with young divers [hopefully with a parent(s) in tow. Those are always a fun [yet challenging] dive, but make for some great pictures…. especially if parents are along to be in the underwater pictures with their kids~! So– going from 2 days of sitting quietly in my chair, straight into a mighty active day. I love it~!

Good Night Y’all + + + + + + + + + + + + + Thankx for stopping in~!

Between long diving days and uncooperative web sites…… boy howdy~ Tuesday we had TWO cruise ships in again and had morning and afternoon dive boats scheduled to accommodate all the cruisers that wanted to dive. Both dive boats were filled to the gills and I was as busy as I could ever want to be taking pictures. I took almost 800 pictures for the day. That got chiseled down to around 200 that I had to edit, but that is still a lot of photo’s to go through. Also still a lot of photo’s to edit. Guess I need to work on trimming that initial number down some~! Thankfully, we didn’t have a dive the next day, so while my Queen was at work – I sat and edited and posted pictures most of the day. With what time I had left before she got home, I vacuumed, did dishes and just some general odds & ends. Neighbors got home just about the same time she did and came over to pick up their dinner (that Angie picked up for them) had a drink and chatted a bit before heading back to their house. I tried to get on here, but the site was acting hinky and wouldn’t load (Admin- if you’re reading this, it is showing a couple of items that ‘need improvement’, but don’t tell me how to do it) so I had to skip writing last night. Course, it could just be this Mickey Mouse internet too. We wrapped the night up with starting off Season Three of Hell’s Kitchen [for the second time], before calling it a night.

Up bright and early again this morning, to get my Bride fed and out the door….. however….. ¼th of the way through her first sammich, she sat it down and told me she wasn’t  feeling up to snuff. About 10 minutes later, she called into Blues and told them she was not going to make it in today (that’s when I knew something was really wrong). Shortly after her phone call she went back to bed. A couple of hours later, she came back out to go potty and asked me to go get some Thera-Flu. By the time I got back, she was back in bed asleep. She got up again an hour or so later, ate a little bit of chicken noodle soup that I made her, took a shot of Thera-Flu and went back to bed. Another 4 hours and up again, another shot of Thera-Flu and is now back in there sleeping again. I feel pretty secure thinking this is just  [hopefully] a 24-48 hour bug of some kind. I have already called off from diving tomorrow so I can stay here with her, to make sure she is alright. Girls— please don’t call her phone. If you need an update, text me….. I am trying to keep it as quiet as possible here so she continues to sleep. Again, I’m sure she is gonna be fine~

Good Night Y’all : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : Thankx for stopping in~!

(Vera— heads up….eel pictures below)

Up a little earlier than I cared for this morning….. had to whizz and my back hurt. Pretty sure back pain is from our mattress as I haven’t moved any tanks in well over a week and haven’t done much else that would have strained my back- that and it didn’t hurt when I went to bed…. so…… Ironically, I was looking at mattresses the other day and as it turns out, there is a store here on the island that carries Tempur-Pedic mattresses. That is what we had back in the states and I loved that mattress. It was also a $2000+ mattress and yes, I know it’s worth it for the health of my back, it’s not very much worth it for the health of our checking account however. And I’m sure in the however many years it was since we bought that first one, that they have went up in price, then factor in island pricing…… One in the store that I looked at was $3800. Gulp…..! So, may have to look at other options. I think I do more damage to my back, flipping and rotating our current mattress than sleeping on it does. Besides, you shouldn’t have to flip and or rotate your friggin’ mattress every couple of months~! A pretty tame day as far as activities. A wonderfully cool breeze blowing all day from the North West, which is 180° from the direction it normally blows. Nice as it is, it is creating some massive swells all around the island. Massive enough, there is concern that the two cruise ships due in tomorrow may not be able to dock. Dammit Emmit~! Let me tell you– it takes some pretty serious wave action to stop those big dudes from dang near anything, so guess I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to find out if I’m diving or not. I’ll have my gear ready to go, just in case. Until then………..

Good Night Y’all % % % % % % % % % % Thankx for stopping in~!