It has been great being home, but I am looking forward to heading South and finding warm weather again. We have had frost a couple of mornings and I had to break out the long pants. I even had to give up my flip flops occasionally because my toes were too cold! We are lucky that we have not had any below freezing temperatures, but we have gotten close at 35 degrees.
There were many advantages about being home. I finally got to have some good tomatoes, corn on the cob and even some crabs. No where else has steamed crabs as good as what we get in Maryland. And it was great sharing them with Brian, Kristina and Kat. Being with family and friends has been the best part about being home, but with COVID worries, we still have not visited as much as we normally would. Randy did his normal daddy duties and helped Kat with a few projects at her house. And he will help Ryan when we stop to see him on our way South. We thought we would spend more time at Ryan’s, but a lot of our free time has been taken by doctor appointments. When we left the Keys at the end of August, I knew i wanted to get home and see my doctors. I was having mild chest pain. It was a strange feeling. It was not consistent every day and it rarely got worse when I was exercising. It felt like indigestion, but i knew it was getting worse so i definitely needed to have it checked out. Once we got home i had a tele-appointment with my primary doctor. She wanted to make sure the pain was not heart related, so she referred me to a cardiologist that I talked with the next day. He scheduled a stress test. The first appointment I could get was originally scheduled for 3 weeks later; after our quarantine had passed. One day after Randy and I went for our morning walk, I had him take me to the hospital. The pressure in my chest and back were worse than they had been before and it scared me enough i wanted it checked out. And I am so glad that I did. They kept me overnight and did a stress test the next morning. Even thought it was inconclusive and the radiologist at Carroll said he did not think the inconsistencies were serious, my cardiologist insisted I have more tests. With the help of my cousin, i got into St. Joe a few days later where the heart cath showed a 90 percent blockage. I am very fortunate that this was found. Quite a few Smith’s in my family have not been so lucky. Unfortunately for me, i was still having chest pains so I still needed more tests. Because i am now on a blood thinner for a year, my cardiologist said I could not have any type of invasive procedure so instead of any type of scope, i had a Barium Swallow test. So far all I have been told is that I have acid reflux. I now take two different medicines to help with the acid reflux, but I still need to watch my diet. No indigestion today so I hope I continue to get better. I was hoping nothing else would delay our trip South, but last week when we went to our final appointment with the eye doctor she wanted a few more tests. I checked out fine, but it looks like Randy has the beginning stages of glaucoma so now he needs to use eye drops twice daily. She recommended laser surgery so she is finding a doctor for us in Florida. This getting old is not any fun.
The best thing we did while we were home was buy a new Jeep Gladiator. i was a little uncomfortable towing the trailer home from Florida. I could feel the Wrangler waddle a little when crossing rough roads and bridges so I wanted something with a longer wheelbase and more towing capacity. We had looked at Jeep Gladiators before, but when Randy tried one out last year, his head hit the roll bar. i am not sure why the Rubicon we looked at felt so tight for Randy, but the Mojave we tried this year was great. I told him I didn’t care what we got, as long as it had heavier tow capabilities. and whatever we got, I wanted blue! I thought he might want a new Ford F150, but he likes the ease of towing the Jeep with the Dirt Yacht so we stuck with a Jeep. I love our new “Dirt Dink.”
We are just waiting for Liberty’s canvas to be repaired that we took to Rebecca to have new isinglass inserted into the front and back panel. Once we get that picked up we will head to Ryan’s to drop it off and to spend a few days with him before heading back to the Keys. I will be happy to have warm weather again!
