RenegadeRider

I know, I know! I haven't posted for a long time. And even though this is by now very dated, here is my report on our SA trip. We departed from LAX on LAN Chile for Lima, Peru and then on to Buenos Aires, Argentina. I was lucky, sort of. I requested an emergency exit seat because of the extra leg room. But the seating diagram at the ticket counter didn’t show the bulkhead for the lavatory. Our lay-over at Lima dispelled any notion that I might have had about Peru being a third world nation. Now, I must admit that an airport terminal probably doesn't represent the entire country. The terminal was as modern and as clean as any I have seen in a long time. They even had WiFi. Another unexpected surprise: Lima was very humid. I then realized that Lima was nearly at sea-level and fairly close to the ocean. I had erroneously thought that it was high in the Andes. We finally were awakened in preparation to land in Buenos Aires. IT was now about 9:00 am local time. The weather was so ...

I have now survived for a year and a day since my heart attack. I didn't even notice.

I commented previously about a lad from San Diego enduring the winter here in Reno. I think it has been raather a bust. Over-hyped. Over-rated. I've seen comments that the Sierra snow pack is only about 50% of normal. In truth, I'm disappointed. I bought a season pass to the Mt Rose ski area. It is about 13 miles from the house. So far I have managed to ski twice. The show is so thin my skis are already severly gouged. The true sign of the seasons though is the stores. They are already stocking with spring (and summer) merchandise.

Dianne & I had both grown up in the north country. Consequently we are not strangers to the winter time. We were still frequently asked if we could survive the cold and snow of Reno after living in San Diego for as long as we had. It is not much of a hardship since we don't need to commute to work. Last week it had been raining mixed with snow. Then about sundown it got a bit colder. I think that we had less than two inches of snow, but the area was essentially paralysed. The roads were all extremely icy. By early the next afternoon the roads had cleared and normal life had resumed.

Happy New Year! It has been nearly six months since I have last posted. Can I return or not?

I think my health issues have been resolved. For the past three months or so I have been experiencing stomach aches, nausea and lack of appetite. I weigh about 30 lbs less than I did six months ago. We had suspected that somehow it might be connected with the drugs I had been taking because of my coronary problems. The cardiologist noticed abnormally high liver enzymes in a blood test. He adjusted and then eliminated an anti-cholesterol drug. It didn't seem to help. We then considered other drugs I had been taking for a number of years. This also proved fruitless. He referred me to a gastroenterologist who ordered more blood tests. Eventually, after a procession of tests that seemed to confirm nothing, he ordered a liver biopsy. The liver biopsy was a procedure that uses ultrasound to guide a needle that was inserted between my ribs to remove a small sample of my lever for examination. I considered the procedure to be essentially a fishing expedition. Following the biops...

About the puppy: we got him from an organization called Corgi Rescue. They told us that the mother was a Corgi and the father was probably a Border Collie, an Australian Shepherd, or an Australian Cattle Dog. We never saw either parent. Now that he is nearing 5 months old we have noticed that he doesn’t resemble any of these breeds. Nor does he resemble either of the corgi breeds. We even attended a dog show, and other than having four legs, we noticed few, if any similarities. His endless energy and bouncing off the wall behavior suggests that he is some variety of herding dog. We have noticed other behavior that also looks to belong to a herding breed. About a week ago Dianne walked him to the nearby Starbucks. Another customer began a conversation and told her it looked like a Kelpie. Searching Google led us to http://www.kelpiesinc.com /, The Working Kelpie. Our opinion is that he could have been one of the dogs that was photographed for this site. A compact, robust, enthu...

Over the past few years Florida has experienced the nearly nation-wide boom in real estate prices and possibly even more so. However, in the past year, the Tampa area has seen a substantial drop in home prices. It may be due in part to the market being over-heated. Another factor might also be the rise in interest rates. But another thing that is driving the price decline is the huge increase in insurance costs since last years hurricane season along with large increases in property taxes due to the increased home values. One home owner, when asked why he was selling said that his insurance went from $500 annually to over $2500. He felt he could not afford to keep his home at that added expense.

I just returned from a week-long trip to Florida. I attended a weekend real estate class by Pete Fortunato. The remainder of the time was spent visiting family and friends. It was the perfect amount of time away from home. In the past, it nearly always seemed too long. It seemed that the last day or even the last week on an extended trip was spent with me wanting to be back home.

Letter to Reno Gazette Journal printed 5/7/06.

Yesterday I had a cardiac stress test. Since I have been participating in a cardiac rehab program for the past six weeks or so, I assumed that the stress test would be relatively easy. Remember the cliche about assuming. I soon learned how wrong my assumptions were. In the rehab program I usually get 40 - 45 minutes of consistent cardio exercise 3 times a week, along with a series of exercises with free weights. Then I usually walk between 2 and 3 miles 2 or 3 of the remaining days. The stress test is designed to monitor the heart function in varying conditions. It begins with the insertion of an IV for the puropse of injecting a radioactive isotope and also for a saline solution while on the treadmill. The isotope used was "technesium". It emits gamma rays and has a half-life of about 6 hours. I believe it does not occur in nature. I then climbed onto the bed of a machine that was a gamma detector. In some ways it resembles a MRI in that the bed moves into the hea...

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A new member of the family.

This past weekend marked the third anniversary of the Iraq war. Anti-war protests were scheduled in many communities all across the country, and even all around the world. Not to be outshone, the Reno lefties held their own protest. It included many of the usual suspects, such as A.N.S.W.E.R. and Code Pink, both with strong Marxist/Stalinist ties. They marched through the downtown casino area and finished up at the Federal building. They had their usual assortment of signs such as "Bush is the terrorist" and "Impeach Bush" etc. In opposition we joined forces with the local Patriot Warrior group and some students from the UNR College Republicans. They had prepared a large number of signs and we brought our flags. We were stationed at the Federal building to greet them as they arrived. We should note that the operation did not seem as smooth and polished as the San Diego PW group. I considered the message on many of the signs to be caustic insults against ...

Protest Warrior group before the arrival of the anti-war group.

The usual suspects, Int'l A.N.S.W.E.R wa in attendance.

The Code Pink contigent.

Standard message.

Typical messages. I don't understand the "Pick Fruit". Note the happy faces.

Our back yard. The mountains at sunrise.