Eh? What?

People can be wonderful. Most everyone I have regular contact with is very understanding about the hearing problem and they circle around me so they can speak in the good ear. Casual contacts are another story. In stores, when you ask people to repeat themselves they are usually annoyed as would I be. In certain stores or restaurants, I can't hear people at all - because of the tinnitus and hyperacuity combination. The choice is between smiling and nodding or asking for a repeat. In social situations, I opt for the smiling and nodding sometimes with disastrous results. I'm learning to avoid loud places, "live" acoustics and things like cocktail parties or other gatherings where there are many voices at once. The book club is even becoming difficult to hear.
I'm looking into hearing aids that might work for AN.

Singapore and PhuQuoc

A two week break from the house in Singapore and PhuQuoc. In Singapore we did the usual things, mostly walked around and ate very well. We stayed at the Scarlet, in Chinatown which was very nice but we like the location of the Swiss Hotel better. On Tiger Airlines we flew to HCMC. Tiger uses the new budget terminal in Singapore which was very efficient although bare bones. In HCMC, we shopped and ate - had eyeglasses made, bought some fake watches and knick-knacks. Only managed one good meal because I was under the weather for much of the time - acute indigestion and my ear was really bothering me. Once we got to PhuQuoc, the ear calmed down immediately as the ocean sounds cancels out the tinnitus. Our resort, La Veranda was beautiful and the ocean was bath-water warm. Everyday we read, cavorted in the waves, ate lunch at the beach shack next door and slept a lot. A most restorative and relaxing time to forget about everything. It was interesting to be out of the country for the election results. Everyone we spoke to was happy about Barack, except the republicans. However most republicans know the party needs a shake-up and a redefinition. This four year period will give them a chance to regroup and rebuild the party back to its basics.

Today the news is breaking that Hillary will be taking the job as Sec of State. Disappointing to those who really expected big changes in the way this administration runs the country. Bill Clinton is now Husband of the Sec of State. Nice job.

Sprinkler system

Turns out that we do have to install a sprinkler system, even though we are under the square footage requirement and even though we are a remodel. Another $6500 expense. Last week we got the driveway jack-hammered out, Gail finished most of the wiring and the dry wall was delivered. The drywall delivery truck arrived at 3:00 and didn't get the load off until 6:00 - pitch black and they had to use the fork lift light to see what they were doing. After they left, the truck pitched off the fork lift on a turn and one of the men ended up with a broken leg. We didn't see this accident as it occured further down on Daily Road. Really unfortunate, but it was so dangerous to be working with this kind of equipment in the dark.

Our doors were all delivered and look very nice but many of them don't fit or have problems. DixieLine is coming up Tuesday to decide what to do with them. A couple have to be returned - one is badly warped.

I'm disappointed with the landscape designer. The plan for the front is very good but the back lacks imagination. We may not continue to the next phase with this group and instead just hire one of the other landscapers to finish it up.

Central vacuum system is installed. This was the easiest of all the subs - he came, he installed, he went home. No muss or fuss.

Recipes for the Girls

The Banar gals invited me to do two recipes for them. Poor Vicki is swamped. I'm doing a Coconut Panna Cotta and a Tropical Fruit Tart. Not too hard. I submitted the ideas to them for the concept. They will get back with approvals of one or the other

Meanwhile Shari is trying to sort out some requests of BB. One was for her to create recipes that will match two photos that the agency had shot. They are supposed to be simple and one of them - a spinach salad should be. The other is a taco that the agency has made very complicated by adding too many ingredients and now they want a simple recipe. Furthermore the photo contains a couple of unbelievable faux pas - a toothpick has been left sticking out of one tortilla and you can see a slice of bread sticking out from under the tortilla..they used it as a prop. Ouch.

I will help Shari with her photos next week for two days. This week she's on her own.

This week I will try to get the bathroom cabinets designed and finish up the kitchen with necessary modifications. I have been suffering with a cold and am just getting over it. Perhaps I'll feel a little more with it.

Ironing

We had to choose an ironing "center" today. A built-in unit for the master bathroom. We chose one with a swivel board and a timer and a spot light. The iron can be plugged in at all times and you only have to turn on a timer to get started. Once done, you put the iron in the rack provided and close the door. It will turn off at the designated time. This is supposed to eliminate the "left the iron on" anxiety that we have all suffered. We'll order the iron tomorrow along with the steam shower - a Thermasol. Once again we are having to learn more than we'd like about all the options. 10 years ago there was only one hide-an-iron called Hide a Board. Now there are about 10. It must be a lucrative business because there is not much to them and the price is high.

We cleaned the rancho today...drywall and crap everywhere. The workers are just throwing their empty food containers and bottles off the roof to wherever. I carried drywall and insulation and will probably get asbestosis now on top of my other problems. Richard worked on filling the dumpster. He picked flowers for me which were in the car when I left with Pinkie. Buster stayed at the rancho on the watch with a Kangaroo Rat, flushed out of one of the closets. He was mesmerized.

Beautiful day today..about as good as it gets. Are we lucky to be living in this marvelous climate. And the bail-out bill was restructured and should pass tomorrow. Does that mean happy times will be here again?

Note to myself: watch out for the ruskies. I think they are on the move again, big time.

Pork tenderloin, baby zucchini, baked potato and a nice salad with hand made croutons for dinner. Life is good.

Big Bail out

Today congress passed the big 700 billion dollar bail out. We have reached a disgraceful place in this country. What a mess. The government blames greedy lenders when the problems rooted in the congressional meddling in the whole process to make fair housing available to the poor and needy. Right.

House-wise, we are getting stucco bids. Lots of plumbing going on...laying pipes and running wires. The roof is stacked with tiles and the felt is on. The upper deck has been water proofed and tomorrow Ken and the boys will be over to hand the big slider and to build the roof ridges, the shower framing and lower the roof in the bedroom. I have a cold and am experiencing some anxiety over the tumor. I'll be happy to have my meeting with the neurologist over with so that I know what I have to deal with. Daily I think my buzzing is getting worse and hearing worse..but I don't know if it's my imagination.

I'm busy with cabinets, appliances and have to make tiles and counter choices. More shopping.

Sssstresss

Stress this week with the arrival of the big beams from Vintage. Instead of 400 pounds which they claimed the big beam was, we estimated closer to 800 pounds. Five guys could hardly budge it. We decided to cut it in half and use half of it on the underside of our arches when you walk in the house. Things are starting to look hunting lodge like but we like it. The massive fireplace and beams are a nice contrast to the La Cantina door. Once it was up, I wished we had bought another for upstairs.
The whole wall looks like glass.

Ken was very shocked at the size of the beams. He thought we meant small beams and got lost in my changing back and forth from fake to real. I only bought the beams because he assured me he could set them. If I ever did something like that again, I would make sure the contractor knew what I was talking about.

The sliding doors were set, the beams raised and the bathroom prepared for the new walk-in shower. We decided on a glass brick wall for the guest shower/steam shower and on the jacuzzi bath tub for upstairs. I have to decide on whether we will wax the beam or not. I know I have to get some stain to touch up a few spots on the wood which are just too stained to be really nice.

Today we have to cover the thresholds and the door edges so the "animals" don't wreck them - that would be the stucco, dry wall and roofers...everybody who comes stomping through.

My New Reality

In Lowe's today, looking at outdoor lights, a man walked past me and I heard, "mumble, mumble, grumble." I asked him, "Are you speaking to me?". He replied, "Mumble, mumble, mumble." I said, "I'm sorry could you repeat that?" and moved closer - again, a mumble. So I told him I couldn't hear in one ear. A look passed over his face and he said "I LIKE YOUR SANDALS!" in a big, loud voice. I laughed at the reaction because it's becoming familiar. Why wouldn't somebody be frustrated after repeating an innocent little compliment three times until it's importance is blown all out of proportion? People run out of patience very quickly. So do I when someone dares not to hear me!!!

I'm thinking of getting earrings that say on one side, good ear and on the other, bad ear.

Goodbye Jaime

Richard had a trying day. Jaime finally just stopped working. Oddly, he slashed his time sheet to ribbons and then went off to sleep in the grove. When Richard confronted him, Jaime cursed at him and flashed his knife. Richard calmly told Jaime he was fired and to leave. There was an outburst of profanity and name calling to Richard, who warily kept his distance and remained calm. Jaime left only to come back because he had left his cell phone behind.

Jaime was a good worker in that he did a job, any job, very well. He completed jobs including clean and putting tools away. he had become more trouble than he was worth - in summary, Richard's complaints:
Jaime at one point, virtually lived in the truck..he would do his laundry and hang it in the garage. The truck stank of Jaimes stinky clothes He never worked 8 hours. It was 7 1/2, then 7 then 6. He was arriving later and later and much of his time was unaccounted for; Richard found that he was coming to work, signing in and then taking off to collect cans around the neighborhood. Somehow, Jaime expected Richard to be benificent, bestowing money on Jaime just because he asked for it. He stole fruit from the grove a bit of a time and then became profligate about it taking as much as 50 pounds a day. We believe he was siphoning gas out of the truck - the tank emptied out awfully fast. He always had his own agenda. He preferred for example working with the construction guys and at one point was acting more like Ken's laborer than ours.

His parting shot was to slash up Richard's little tomato bush - we don't know everything he did - Richard will find out what was stolen and what ruined over the next few days. Richard believes Jaime to be insane or at least out of control. We are relieved to be done with him.

Equal and Cedar Rapids

Shari and I went to Cedar Rapids this week to do a presentation at Swank for Equal. We were not well prepared as neither of us were particularly into it. Our contact at Equal is gone, replaced by an unknown quantity and so our work there is probably over. I guess that's the reason we were so unenthusiastic. However, Shari and I enjoyed ourselves in first class both there and back which made the travel much easier.

Our little presentation went OK but I felt we were faking and dodging most of the questions. I particularly can't get behind the product at the moment because of my own anxiety about my AN. This may be distracting me in a bigger way than I acknowledge. I find if I keep really busy I don't notice the buzz so much. Coming down in the aircraft to Minneapolis, my buzz turned into applause for a while which was scary but it settled down in a little bit.

Shari and I shared a pork tenderloin sandwich and we also ordered cheese balls which were deep fried. Not exactly the most nutritious meals you could experience. Pork rules in Iowa.

Mid-September

This week marked the completion of the fireplace stoning and we picked up the mantle from Vintage Timer and appied the stain. It looks pretty good, full of character. The fireplace also turned out as expected. Now we are stuck waiting for the plumber to give us a price on jack hammering out the bathroom shower floor to replace it with the correct pitch for drain so that our shower can be a walk-in one. Gary is a nice guy but a lousy communicator - he simply does not return my calls and I have to ask Dan to intervene whenever I want him.

The roof is progressing and some of the paper is already on. They will load the tiles sometime during the week. We have one stucco bid but require a few more. I've decided against Cats Paw as I think it will be too busy with the wrought iron and our ultra fancy roof. Just too much going on. Now to convince Richard.

Our Anderson windows have been checked out by the Dixieline rep. He was surprised that some were as bad as they were. One has to be replaced completely. He repaired the latches that fell off immediately after coming out of the boxes.

In Bali they are working on our stair railings and should finish up this week. The whole order will then be shipped and will arrive within two months.

Gail continues to work on the electrical and has many questions..all good ones and all of which will help us get some really good lighting installed. Both Richard and I like well-lit houses so this part is fun.

Framing Finished

Ken and company have almost completed the framing. They have yet to do a few things and install the beams. Most of this should be completed next week. Jerry made a very nice arch for over the bedroom door and he added some bumps to the chimneys, finishing them off.

The foreman from Dan's roofing has been by and is planning to put the felt on next week. We have a lot of under belly stuff to do this week before we move forward again. Hot mop on the deck, before the sliders can be installed; shower pan to be resolved, before more plumbing can be done; a steam shower to purchase and a bathtub for upstairs.

Elbow gave us a reduced bid for the front wall. $7500.00. The partnership between him and Oscar has fallen apart and Elbow now wishes to pretend that we are paying him by the hour for future jobs to cut out his mordita to Oscar. Another construction politics - Ken fired Jeff off the job. Rob fired Dan. Are we bad luck or is this just the way it goes?

My left ear

My ear problem turns out to be more than expected. An MRI revealed an acoustic neuroma, a benign growth sitting on the vestibular nerve. These neuromas occur when a certain protein, effective against tumor growth and controlled by a gene on chromosome 22, ceases to be generated. It is a genetic mutation. Schwamma cells, a thin layer which sheaths the nerve start to grow. Eventually they form a mass...mine is the size of a BB at the moment. They are unpredictable..some grow slow, some fast. Some grow fast for a while and then slow down. Some grow fast and then slow and some disappear.

I've had a few days of gathering information to the point of overload so now I'll just leave it alone until I see the neurologist and get the info straight from the horse's mouth. For now I'll bet I get put into the W & W group - watch and wait. From my reading the treatment I'd select would be radiation knife. Risks abound no matter what path you choose.

Bottom line is the tinnitus is with me forever so I get used to it.

Goodbye Infiniti

The end of an era. Richard owned the Infiniti for 13 years and he sold it yesterday to a very tall chap from Escondido. He bought it for his son who crashed his car. We advertised it on Craig's list
with no result and finally he put it in the Penny Saver which yielded some results this week. He also lowered the price from the original $5000, to $3000. It was sold for $2750.00.

What a great little car! It took us to the airport inumberable times and waited for us patiently to return enduring all the indignities of public parking lots - sometimes even bearing inclement weather when parked outside. Never failing significantly, the only problems I had with it were purely operator error..forgetting to turn the lights off on two occasions. I loved the car - it was a "don't care" car and I could park wherever I wanted and not worry about door dings or renegade shopping carts or rock dings. Of course, little happened to the car no matter where it
was put.

I hope it likes it's new home and the young man who will operate it will be careful with it and get another 100,000 miles of service.

Friday night and a movie

We seem to have little time available for recreation now. I can't say we aren't having fun with the Rancho but it's very demanding and eats up all of our time. In a rush, we left the Rancho together and got down to the auto repair place where Richard had left the SUV for removal of over-spray. Side bar: Jaime damaged the truck one day while working on the stream. Oscar knew of a cheap auto repair place in town. Meanwhile Richard backed the SUV into the truck and further damaged it plus made $5,000 worth of damage to the SUV (conventinal estimate). SUV was repaired via the Mexican underground economy for about $2000 while truck repairs were about $1500 - $1000 our damage and $500 Jaime's.

Car transfers were made and it was 4:45 when we ran out of here to Temecula for the 5:00 movie. We made it by 5:20 and missed a bit of the movie opening. Traitor, starring Don Cheadle. I liked it very much except for another sappy ending. Nobody seems to be able to write a script with a satisfying, not sappy, conclusion. Plot was fast-paced, very current (Muslim terrorists)and chilling. The essence of the plot was an attempt by terrorists to have 50 suicide bombers on 50 buses right in the heartland of the US and they chose
Thanksgiving Day for the show. There's a good twist in that Cheadle puts the bombers all unknown to each other, on the same bus!!

After the movie we ate a good dinner at a Japanese Teppanyaki House in the Bellagio shopping center. We entered with some reservation, not knowing what to expect. The restaurant has a bar up front and a passageway into the place which follows a large stream. At the end of the walk, the restaurant opens into a large noisy hall, with about 12 teppanyaki stations each seating about 20 people. All tables seemed full. We ate in the dining room and ordered off the menu - calamari, gyoza, eggplant, 10 ingredient fried rice, Richard (one unagi). Food was excellent - piping hot, right out of the fryer/oven whatever. Service was excellent - our little waitress was appropriately pleasant and just personal enough (telling us that she doesn't eat raw food) to make you relax and trust her - this is quite a trick. She brought the food quickly, checked back on us a few times, cleared the plates away swiftly. It was a good experience and we will go back. A nice surprise and a good evening out together and leaving El Rancho behind for a while.

Down by the old Mill Stream

The stream project is moving toward completion. Oscar and Elbow (aka Abel) have completed the following work: cleaned out the whole length of the stream; laid the first half with our concrete chunks rescued from demolition; built up the culvert at the beginning of the property - poured footings and directed the water; concreted in the beginning of the stream; repaired the road holes at all over passes; built a drain to dry out the wet spot in the grove; removed all the tires and shored up the sides with concrete bags; built new gates with nifty wheel operation for two spots and also built a grate for one spot in the fence. I picked out rocks at Southwest Boulder and will send Oscar over to actually select rocks that he and the crew can move. We will get one ton of the largest rocks they can manage, then one ton of large cobbles (15" across) and one or two tons of medium sized rocks. Scattering them along the stream should improve appearance and make it look pretty good. Planting will be a challenge because so many weeds want to grow there..it's wet and really fertilized.

It's satisfying to have this job done. The "stream" had become a dirty ditch and now is an attractive feature of the grove. Between this improvement and Jaime's work shoring up branches and keeping order, the grove looks really good. I hope we will be ablet to keep it all up. There's a lot of investment made but the Rancho will be our permanent and last home, so it should be good looking and comfortable.

My Left Ear

I made an appointment with an ENT because my buzzing Left ear does not seem to be improving, in fact I think it's getting worse. Difficulty hearing things on the phone and a distorted perception of music are the final, intolerable symptoms driving me to seek out help.

The audiologists test revealed that I have 40% hearing loss, particularly in the higher range of sound in my left ear. Right Ear is functioning well. Using Ron's finger rubbing technique, it's quite obvious, the difference in the two ears. A separate trip to the ENT resulted in a cursory diagnosis of nerve damage due to viral infection. This is an uncommon occurrence; nor is it uncommon to have hearing loss accompanied by tinnitus. The ENT ordered an MRI to rule out the possibility of an auditory tumor. Blood work was also ordered which revealed a small under-performance of my thyroid gland which can be corrected and under-performing thyroid is related to tinnitus. Plot thickens.

The distortion of sound is annoying but compared to deafness, I can't complain. Sound is not what it used to be. Sometimes the buzzing drives me mad - makes me cranky and a little panicked that I can't get away from it. Makes you want to rip your ear off. I do look forward to losing consciousness at night and escaping for a while. On the construction site, when the compressor is running or the nail guns are firing off, I can't hear anything. I just tell people I can't hear them and wait for quiet, then resume conversation. Most people are understanding about this. Poor Richard bears the brunt of constantly repeating himself.

Richard also visited the doctor this week to see about the lingering severe pain that resulted from his fall off the bike. He has three cracked ribs and a bruised lung (likely). At the same visit he had several small skin thingies removed and now has scabs on face and neck. He will be having the skin peel done soon - he calls this the "crab boil".

I guess I could ask Sharon to pray for my Left Ear. Seems terribly trivial compared to 2 million people flooded out in India. I wonder if they have a prayer value rating scale?

I should have listened to more music while I could.

Windows and Fireplace

At week's end, two big accomplishments: windows are installed and the fireplace covering with Canyon Rock has started. Windows latches and controls are disappointing. Two windows aren't working properly and the latches are falling apart. We've called DixieLine to get some attention to these problems. The windows do look good however.

The Rock looks really, really good. After so much agonizing, I'm pleased with the result. I don't think Tony the mason is so pleased as he probably underbid the job. His guys accidentally browncoated our beehive fireplace - it's being stuccoed and the stucco people s should do it.

we are working on kitchen, bathrooms, lighting, plumbing and some roofing issues. Nothing goes smoothly at all..there is always something to unravel. Another good thing this week is that we received pictures of the door made in Bali along with photos of gate and railings and it all looks wonderful. They will be shipping it all out soon.

Buster and Pink: Just a note to remember..the boys are getting pretty big. Buster 11 pounds and Pinkie (Inkie Stinky Pinky) is 7 pounds - much slighter and tinier. They eat together and Pinkie still gets all he wants to eat. Buster pins him down for clean-up from time to time. Pinkie caught a rabbit, they've gotten several mice and love running around at the Rancho. After the workers leave, the cats move into the house and climb all over the rafters and everywhere they can squeeze themselves into.

Saturday with Jim

Jim needs new flooring because of a leak in his kitchen. All the flooring on the kitchen, TV room, family room, living room and piano room will be replaced. We visited a carpet/flooring store in Yorba Linda and looked at some samples. The salesman was the classic glad-handed, "We'll take good care of you Mr. Ryckenbosch" type. At some points, my jaw was hanging open, the guy was so corny. Jim has confidence in them because they did a good job of refinishing his floors which now will have to be removed. This chap had a "smoking hot" deal on hand scraped flooring from China, $10.00 per foot installed.

We had lunch at Jim's neighbors who were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary. She had her wedding albums out and on display and it was very interesting to read them. She was a debutante and raised in Westwood, a UCLA graduate. He apparently was a very smart, nobody as his lineage was not on the record. They stayed at the Santa Barbara Biltmore on their honeymoon and the second night at none other than "Tickle Pink" which was $16.00 per night. How funny. I asked him if they were going up to Tickle Pink again in the near future and he said it was very difficult to pry her out of the house. 50 years will do that to a person. Big congratulations to anyone who can last together for that long.

Sadness still overcomes me when I visit Alta Drive. I miss Eilleen and keep waiting for her to appear to make a sandwich or open a bag of treats from Trader Joe. It's still hard for me to believe that she's dead sometimes. It all seems to be a bad dream.

Jim has a new Lexus! Very nice car and it suits him well. He likes driving it so far.

Summer is running away from us fast. I wish we had summer for 9 more months 'til the house is finished. It would be so nice to have the long days and the warm weather as the rancho is so nice this time of year.

Saturday and getting a slow start. Thursday and Friday the heating and air conditioning people came and did a lot of engineering. The metallic arms are crawling all over the house and look like a MRI of the house guts. The ducts take up more space than they should and we are having to give up some storage space to accomodate them. Meanwhile the framers continue to slog along trying to repair the miscalculation on the upstairs trusses. I've taken everything to the architect and am waiting to hear back from them.

Also pressing is the selection of stone (I'm having an awful time), electrical matters - Richard has very strong ideas about lighting, and finally finishing up the Bali things. I may make a last ditch effort at the stair railing...the risk is about $1200. Buying the railing here and installing it will be over $5,000.00 which is ridiculous for 8 stairs.

The plumber should be starting next week and the fireplace extension will be installed. The only thing preventing the mason from getting in and doing the fireplace is my stone selection. The other thing pressing is selection of someone to install the exterior doors.

Meanwhile the stream is coming along. Oscar feels the prep will be completed this weekend and they will concrete it all in next weekend. I've asked for a price on Elbow digging out the front courtyard and building the short wall at the front.