Missing My Granddaughter

You miss your adult children when their careers or marriage take them too far away for more than rare visits. However, you had the pleasure of enjoying them as babies, toddlers, teens and adults .It is different with grandchildren who live a long distance away. I am thinking of my granddaughter Lily who lives with her parents Mark and Julie in the DC area. We were there when Lily was born July 9 and we got to enjoy her over the Christmas and New Years holidays. Young children change everyday and it is a great pleasure to see them develop and grow. It hurts to miss that with grandchildren.

Happy Birthday, George Washington

The feds can pick any day they want for a holiday and call it President's Day, but us old-timers know that February 22 is Washington's birthday. Ole George would be out of place with politics today. They say he could not tell a lie, so how could he fit in with today's politicians to whom lying seems to be second nature? Happy birthday George; we wish we had more like you.

Iwo Jima -- 65th anniversary

February 19 is a date I always remember -- the anniversary of the invasion of Iwo Jima. It is hard to believe that it has been 65 years since the battle began. I was a radarman serving on the USS Pickens, APA 190, an amphibious assault vessel. Iwo is a small volcanic island that was defended by only about 20,000 Japanese but it was traversed by tunnels that protected the Japs. Iwo was important because of its airport and radar station. They detected our bombers on the way to bomb Tokyo and shot down our damaged planes returning to Saipan and Tinian. We joned other ships in landing marines who faced fierce opposition even at the beginning. Our ship served as an auxiliary hospital ship and our boats returned from the first landing with wounded marines.
Navy men went with the marines as beach parties to provide communications and direct the landing of tanks and other equipment. I asked to be assigned to a beach party but was of course denied ( to my relief). During landings I manned a phone at a debarkation station so was on the main deck and saw the American flag raised, lowered, and raised again, which was when Joe
Rosenthal shot his famous picture.
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Health Plan we can agree on

Nearly everyone can agree on some things to be in a health plan, such as including all who want to be included, costs be contained or lowered, quality be maintained or bettered, and that we get the benefit of the latest research and drugs. How can any of this be done without increasing costs or limiting services to some, probably the elderly on medicare. Can we expect doctors, hospitals and drug companies to lower their charges? Can we count on insurance companies to give up their profits? Yes, it is easy to outline what we would like to have in a health plan but not easy to come up with a way to get it done. We can become more efficient in some things, such as better use of expensive diagnostic tools, but health care is going to continue to take a big chunk out of our gross national product.

Time to plant Irish potatoes

Valentine's Day has come and gone I haven't planted Irish potatoes once again. In fact I do not expect to have any type of vegetable garden this year. When I was a kid on the farm we tried to plant potatoes by Valentine's Day, or as close to this date as possible. Climate conditions used to make this possible. I can also remember setting out onion plants in February, giving time for onions to grow in cool weather. Some people planted corn in February, but my memory is that we usually got corn in the ground in March. We also planted corn in June.

It used to be said it was time to plant cotton when china berry trees began blooming.

Happy valentines day

I have been absent from the blog for a few days because of illness. I had planned to give my
solutions to all of the economic problems the country faces! That will have to wait.

I saw another back doctor Wednesday, but it only amounted to a conversation. I had another appointment with pain management Friday morning but canceled because of illness. I was really sick Thursday night and Friday. I felt like my lungs were filled with fluid. ZI was so hot I sat up from 2 till after 4 and then got so cold I could not get warm no matter how much cover I had. The worse problem was trouble breathing. I'm better but am very weak.

Now we are getting snow and I don't like it.

Mark has sent us pictures of snow in the DC area and now we are joining the snow belt, the second time this winter it has snowed here in Shreveport. Snow has been lightly falling since early this morning but as mostly melted as it strikes warm building and ground. My car is covered, though,and with five inches predicted for tonight and a doctor's appointment at 8, I've got problems. So have Jen, Matthew and Jason. I'll have to get up early to get snow off windshield and windows.

I have never been a great lover of snow. It was exciting and something to look forward to when I was a kid on the farm, but it came with a cost. Chores such as milking cows, feeding horses and chickens, hauling in fire wood took away much of the excitement and pleasure. Now I have no desire for snow -- none at all. Why live in the South if you are going to have bad winters. Let Erie Pa. and other snow areas keep it-- they are used to it. In Erie you are  required to have snow tires or chains by September or face a fine.