For believers, death is not a period but it's only a comma in the continuing story of life.

Hello friends and neighbors, howdy do to you all. It is Tuesday, August 9, 2011, and I am glad to report that I survived my meeting with my new doctor. As initial visits go, I thought it went well, except for the fasting they asked me to do which turned out not to be necessary, (No Community until nearly 11 a.m., I ask you: what is this world coming to?) and the forty minute wait in the examination room, but I always read everything on the wall so I didn't waste the time and had I known the nurse's password I would  have spent a little time checking out their system. The doctor is young, quick, seems to be very intelligent, and as we talked he keyed in information into his patient database. I felt like we covered quite a bit of territory in just a few short minutes. It is, after all, the brave new world where this computer talks to the other computer and they figure out what should be done with you, or to you, or maybe, even, for you. You prefer the old fashioned way. I can actually remember when Doctor Stephens did make house calls back when I was a little dude suffering from the flu. That style of doctoring pretty well went the way of the buffalo a long time ago. And, here we are in the so-called information age and my new doctor is making referrals online even as we talked and when I walked out the door they handed me some reports that indicated all that had been accomplished in my visit. The nurse was pleasant except for when she told me she would be giving me my 5 year pneumonia shot in the fatty part of my arm. Fatty part of my arm? Hello? How about the pleasingly plump part of my arm? Or, the part with the most muscle mass? What's that? Be glad she didn't say the flabby part of my arm. Thanks. I suppose that makes it better. By the way, a five year shot to protect from pneumonia? Five years? I can only imagine what my billions of cells thought when that five year vaccine started showing up. "Look who showed up Ma, they said they would be hanging out here for the next five years!" But it was a good visit and now back to the other stuff that has made its way to the front burners on my stove top, you know the proverbial stove top of life.

I know that my daily dishing is primarily about me. That's typically because when it comes down to it, that is what I know the most about. I try to not let it be an ego trip because, believe me, I've been around long enough to know what happens whenever folks become a legend in their own minds. While you might not believe it from reading my blogs, for the most part I'm considered to be a fairly serious person, even too much so. Maybe the writing helps me to be channel a lighter side and to reflect a little less solemnity. Truth is, we all have the mundane to deal with every day but that doesn't mean we have to be mundane in response. Blogging has helped me to be on the look out for a good story. Where there are people, there are stories. The nurse in the doctor's office was a sweet lady. She began apologizing for the wait before it was even past my appointment time, and that puzzled me, but later I realized she already knew how far behind they were, hence, the forty minute time they left me unattended in that exam room. While I didn't open any drawers, that may have been on the agenda next had the doctor not knocked on the door. Yep. He knocked on the door. What else could one do but to say come in? Awkward to say the least. The nurse had me get up on their scales. The number was insane. I had just weighed at 3:30 a.m. before I left the house and I know I hadn't gained 12 pounds on my way there. She asked what I had weighed and said she would put that down because their scales were only a cheap bathroom scale to begin with, and worn out anyway. This is one of the most highly touted, major medical facility networks in the Southwest and they can't afford an accurate scale? No. I wasn't fudging on the number either. I had checked my home scale by my mom and dad's digital unit when I visited them weekend before last. I will tell you this, I must have gotten up and down off those scales a half dozen times while I was waiting, but they still gave the same reading even when I held on to the table. It is a funny world, don't you think?

When I finally left that place I went to the nearest fast food joint. Why? It had been about 14 hours since I had eaten anything and I needed food....fast. They delayed my order for about 10 minutes to wait on a fresh batch of biscuits to be ready. The lady that took my order said she didn't want to serve me a hard biscuit that had been under a lamp for a while. I thanked her but to tell the truth a hard biscuit, any biscuit, would have been helpful at that particular moment. I gobbled it down and felt refreshed. I thought about going back over to that examination room to see just how much that sausage biscuit would have added to the number on  that cheap scale. Maybe I will take my personal scale with me next time I go. On a more serious note, our dear mother, 87 years young, is scheduled to undergo some bladder repair surgery early Wednesday morning over in Louisiana. That may seem like a minor deal but at her age she is rightly concerned, therefore, I would ask each of my readers to whisper a prayer for her. She is our family champion and we thank God for her every single day. You don't know my mom? Google 'World's Greatest Mom', and her photograph will come up. Okay. It may not come up because those Google people don't know the half of it, know what I mean? She does comes up as being the greatest to all of us kids, and we are pleased at any time and on any occasion to rise up and say so. May God bless and take care of our sweet mother, and may God bless each one. Amen.     ....More later.