Sisters Time, Fathers Day, and a Walk Around Oakland Kaiser

We traveled from Capitola on Thursday to Lafayette to stay with my sister Lorraine and her husband Bill so we would be rested enough to go to Doug's cardiology appointment the next day. Our GPS instructed us to go a different way, so we decided to take "her" advice. We ventured along the Soquel-San Jose Rd, and experienced more of a back road, picturesque way. It was pretty windy, but I love windy roads, and it spit us out on to highway 17 at Summit Road, missing a lot of freeway driving.

Lorraine and I had a long overdue visit, catching up with what has been happening in our lives. I tried to help her fight off a wild turkey that was bothering her by trying to use the edge of their pool as a bathroom. Between her squirting a hose at it and me flailing my arms and yelling, we made her fly at least one time over the fence and into the bushes at the back of the yard. The trouble is, Bill enjoys watching the darned thing from his chair, so he hopes we won't discourage it too much.

The cardiologist recommended that Doug should have an IV Lasix treatment in addition to the usual Lasix he's been taking, since his legs and abdomen had so much edema. As we understood it, it would make him pee like a racehorse, hopefully reducing the swelling. She sent the referral, but since it was late on a Friday, she wasn't sure if he would have an appointment on Monday or not. That meant staying in Lafayette an extra night and hoping for the best.

That let us have a more relaxing time on Father's Day, so Doug got to see all of his kids at once at a brunch at Fat Apple's. All 5 of them were there, including John and his new bride on Facetime from Idaho, and almost all of the grandkids and their dads, so he was really pleased.

On Monday, I tried to figure out how to call ahead in the morning to see if the appointment would happen, and then actually got a call from Kaiser offering one at 10:45! We had a quick breakfast, and got there in time. They said Doug might be there for up to 4 hours, so I brought my earbuds, my phone and a charger, a seltzer water, and a bag with a little mending project in it to keep myself busy.

After he got weighed and all settled in, I blew him a kiss (the nurse said, "Oh, you two are so cute!") and decided to go for a walk around the Broadway St area next to Oakland Kaiser. The first thing I noticed was that the entire old Kaiser hospital where I had Jennie, my daughter, had been totally leveled, leaving a fenced-off, block-square crater filled with grass.

I kept walking toward MacArthur Blvd, and as I was crossing, I saw a chubby Chihuahua dog scampering through Mosswood Park, followed in full pursuit by a teenaged boy wearing a hoody, on his bicycle. The dog ran out into traffic on Broadway, and the boy followed him out, stopping traffic briefly, while the little dog turned back and ran back into the park. As I crossed the street, the boy seemed to be losing the race, and the dog headed back toward the street. I decided to see if I could be of help, and try to head him off at the pass. The dog diasappeared though, perhaps running into a fenced area, and the boy rode over a hill of dirt near me. "Is that your dog?", I asked. "No, It belongs to some lady.", he said, breathlessly. Then he simply rode away, down the sidewalk on Broadway.

Hmm, I thought. I tried to peek in through the slits in a fence, but saw no dog. Oh well, at least that was pretty entertaining.

I walked across a wide expanse of grass, still glancing around for the Chihuahua, but all I saw was a man with a satchel over his shoulder, using something as a walking stick. I thought he was picking up trash and putting it in his sack, but as I got closer, I saw that he stopped, took a baseball out of his sack, and hit it with what was actually a bat as far as he could across the field. He hit a few, and then went back to retreive them all.

Just ahead, I saw what seemed to be a summer day camp with about 25 kids playing games under the guidance of a couple of counslors. I almost stopped to sit and watch them, but I glanced at my watch, and it told me I hadn't walked very far, so I kept going on. Farther down, a young man was in charge of 4 other kids at a baseball diamond. He lobbed a ball to them. One of them missed it, another caught it, and threw it to first base, where he tossed it back to home. This was so nice to see.

I passed what was a community garden that hadn't been paid attention to for a while, and then headed back along MacArthur. At the bus stop there was some sort of memorial with glass candles, some lit, and some little electronic votive candles that were lit, but not too visible in the sunshine. There was no sign of who the memorial was for.

Up ahead, I saw a young woman stopping to take a photo of a big bird that was sitting on top of an eight foot lamp post. As I got closer, I saw it was a hawk. I thought I'd snap a pic too, but no sooner had I got out my phone, the bird started flapping it's wings and flew, revealing that it had a smaller bird in it's talons! "That poor pigeon never had a chance!", the girl said as she went on her way.

Heading back up to the 5th floor, I decided to camp out in the waiting room next to a plug to charge my phone, started to listen to Tom Hanks reading his book on Audible, called, "The Making of Another Motion Picture Masterpiece", took out my tangerine flavored soda water, and was about to continue sewing a patch on my favorite shorts, when Doug called me to say that they were letting him out early. They were pleased with the liter of pee that he had presented them with, and he was free to go! Well, I thought, at least I got a little walk in!

He was talking to a doctor when I came back in, and was eating a complimentary turkey sandwich, which he shared with me. The doc said to continue with his Lasix pills and potassium chloride, elevate his legs as much as possible to let them know they are supposed to be releasing that fluid. It turns out that since the last 5 days, when Doug had taken extra Lasix, and after this IV treatment, the scale said he had lost 18 pounds! This is a success that many folks wouldn't mind experiencing. He was given a new urinal as a parting gift. ; ) , and we were on our way. ( It was actually necessary by the time we hit Los Gatos).

An early dinner on the Santa Cruz wharf at Firefish sounded appropriate as a celebration of successful appointments. We remembered their outstanding fried calamari and shared a cup of chowder, and watched the pelicans dive down into the ocean. Outside on the wharf, we could hear the screams of kids on rides at the Boardwalk, and the loud arf arf arf of the seals under the pier, but we were happy to continue on our way to our temporary home in a little cottage in Capitola.