Today - URI, Rash, Clinic, Locksmith, WalMart, CVS, Nap, Yard; "Barking Up the Right Tree"

Another assortment of items I've encountered of late.

For a couple weeks, every since I started trimming the cedar tree in the back, I noticed a rash on both forearms that didn't want to go away. I've tried a couple of over-the-counter lotions and ointments to no avail.

And I'd noticed a recurrence of the upper respiratory problem. So this morning, I decided I needed to pay the doctor a visit.

A couple of years ago, I developed a rash on my neck from wearing a plastic-weave lanyard ID badge. (I didn't think you could be allergic to plastic. Just shows how little I know.) The first batch of ointment did nothing. So I had to go back for a different, stronger batch.

Several times the docs have mentioned steroid shots as the quickest way to solve this problem. But about fifteen years ago, I noticed that every time, I had a shot, I felt really weird - crying, severe depression, numbness, dizzyness. I mentioned it, and one of the doctors said these were the prime symptoms of Steroid Psychosis. Hence, I've learned to avoid steroid shots.

The first thing I did on arriving at the doctor's office was to lock myself out of my car. Which I don't think I've every done before. I called a locksmith, and a burly guy in a white Cruiser popped up in about ten minutes. He used a strange-looking handheld pump and a lasso dervice and had the door open in 30 seconds.

The doctor took one look at my arm and said "posion ivy." I really thought it was a reaction to the cedar and had not thought of posion ivy. But in respect, I do remember some three-pronged-leaf vines. (By the way: posion ivyhas. become more virulent due to global warming. There have been several stories in the news in the past week or so.)

I was starving, so I had a semi-quick lunch at Golden Corral and headed for a nearby garden shop to look for long-sleeved gloves. In general they didn't have any, and they certainly didn't have any in my size.

I stumbled around WalMart and found a couple of rubber dishwashing gloves that I thought might work. While I was there, I also picked up a magnetic box for storing an extra key on your car. I figured a $2 box was better than a $38 locksmith bill. And I also grabbed a 100-foot electrical extension cord. As is, when I do the front yard, I have to use a 100-foot cord attached to a 12-foot power strip attached to a second 12-foot strip.

My last stop was CVS where I got prescriptions for an ointment and an antibiotic. The doctor gave me some type of promotional coupon that gave me the antibiotic for no cost.

Five minutes have leaving the drugstore, I realized I'd forgotten to ask about two prescriptions I'd called in yesterday. I was so tired at this point, I figured it could wait another day.

When I got home, unloaded the car, pushed the cats out of the way and stored everything, I placed my extra key in the magnetic box and tried to find some metal on the car. So much of it is plastic, that it took me about 15 minutes to find a place that I thought would work.

Now I decided it was time for a nap.

I woke up about 4:30, dragged myself outside, hooked up the reciprocating saw and attacked a set of pine roots. Some were easy, and some proved a real pain. But I finally finished several hours later. So that now means the entire side north of the house is free of roots. Still more work to be done though. The walk needs re-placing. I want to create a bed next to the concrete using old bricks as a border. And there's a bed at the back that runs about five feet on the north side and about 25 feet on the west side. And there are two bushes there that I've cut down, but the stumps need removing.

Fron the June issue of "ARTNews" about a show at the Bruce Museum of Arts and Science in Greenwich, Connecticut called "Best in Show: Dogs in Art from Renaissance to Today."

"When the show opens at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, in October, it will be joined by a smaller show dedicated to that age-old canine nemesis, the cat. Why do cats appear in art so much less frequently than dogs? Exhibition organizerr Edgar Peters Bowron, curator of European art at the Houston museum, hazards a guess, 'As art historian Kenneth Clark noted, they don't normally sit still on command.' "

PAX!