Time Warp?

It has been a little over a month since my last post, and it feels like we have been in a time warp in the interim…or maybe that, like Alice, we stepped through the looking glass into some place we never wanted to be.  Unlike hers, ours wasn't magical.

I don't think it was the moon, although we did enjoy watching the super wolf blood moon total eclipse on January 20.  Here is the before image,

followed by a couple of progress shots,

and finally the beautiful blood color as the eclipse achieved totality.

So, here is the whole sordid through-the-looking-glass story.  We had made a quick trip to the farm on January 24 to feed the cows and check things.  Then, on Friday, January 25 as we were returning to Austin, John began experiencing severe back pains and extreme nausea.  I drove home, and by the time we reached Leander, he did something he has never done before (and I hope never needs to do again).  He told me to pull into the St. David’s Emergency Clinic just south of Seward Junction.  

He was the only patient, and received lots of attention and many tests, but little relief.  The first doctor thought he had a kidney stone; the second diagnosed diverticulitis.  The IV medications gave him a short respite from the pain, and after a delightful hour or so at the 24-hour pharmacy we went home with fistfuls of drugs for pain and nausea, as well as antibiotics for the supposed bowel infection.  That launched us into two-plus weeks of tests and doctor visits during which the pain abated somewhat, but the nausea persisted, to the puzzlement of all concerned.  

The good news is that, after two more emergency room visits, multiple appointments with various specialists, more tests and a three-day stay in the hospital, John is finally back to better-than-normal.  The culprit was apparently an extremely low blood sodium level.  His blood pressure medications have been adjusted; the sodium is back to normal levels, and he says he feels better than he has in years.  On the upside, he has lost over 15 pounds that he didn’t need in the first place, and is looking a lot more like the man I married some 22 years ago.  (I need to do some more pound-shedding myself if I'm going to resemble the woman he married.) John is happy that he feels and looks better, but says he doesn’t recommend what he had to go through to get there.

Soooo.....life is returning to normal around here.  We are back at the farm for a few days.  It's cold this week, and the cows appreciate a bale of hay and some range cubes to supplement the winter grass that is beginning to sprout.

Rue makes sure No. 7 doesn't get more than her fair share of the hay.

And yesterday, before the rain set in, John and Daniel set the posts for the new working pen.  (Thank you ever so much, Allan and Jef for cutting all those beautiful posts!)  

We will head back to Volente tomorrow, and expect it to look a little more springlike the next time we visit.