What a good patient!

I got a call from the vet who does acupuncture yesterday with an opening in the afternoon so changed plans and took him. Vivian was here and we had planned on going to the Arboretum but instead had an interesting afternoon learning about pet acupuncture, chiropractic and Chinese Herbal teas as they all relate to treating pets. I was a little leery when the primary vet for Morris suggested this method of treatment instead before rushing into surgery.  I looked the new vet up on line to verify that she was indeed a "real vet" which she is plus has several degrees from Vet Schools that also teach pet acupunture, etc.

I just could not believe how Morris just laid there and let her put the needles in and do the treatment. She had quit doing cats because they are so hard to treat but said if they were all like Morris she would go back to treating cats. Instead of "twirling the needles", she hooked probes to them so there was some electrical current and he didn't care. When she was done with the acupuncture, she did a chiropractic treatment on his back - not the snapping but just a massage in specific places and stretching. Again, he didn't care what she was doing. She thinks that his problem is in the L12 which seems to be offset from the other verterbrae thus pressing on nerves.  It probably happened when he hit the desk while trying to jump up on it.  He still isn't drinking or eating properly plus has some intestinal issues because he isn't getting enough fluids.  She says that it may take a few treatments before those things improve. He has never been good at drinking water out of a dish and getting up on the toilet for a drink is impossible right now. I put a little footstool in front of the window and now he gets up on the footstool and then on up to the window sill where he lays since he can't jump up on the window sill.  In the meantime, the price per pound for Morris keeps going up....... In the below picture, you can really see his morphine patch.  I take him in tomorrow to get that removed. The pain medication doesn't seem to make any difference which makes them think it is all a nerve issue.  He doesn't seem to be in any pain when walking, he just is really weak in his back legs and sometimes one of them will collapse on him. Poor guy!  It was really good to have Vivian along yesterday during the drive over to the vet which is about 30 minutes from home. She held his carrier on her lap, opened the top a bit so he could stick his head out and see what was going on while she petted him.  Never once did he go into full screaming mode which was a relief. Needless to say he does not trust me when he sees me walking toward him since he thinks it is time for another trip to a vet....  We have 3 more appointments scheduled and should know by then if the treatments are going to work or not. In the meantime, I am trying to find things he will drink and switch him from all dry food to mostly canned cat food which has more liquid in it.  So far I haven't found one he really likes but will get a few more different brands to day to try him on. Milk seems to be his preferred liquid with the toilet bowl of water not available. What an experience!

All Things Medical.....

Morris: I pick him up at the hospital around 5 today. The vet called me a little while ago to give me an update and his recommendations. He decided it was probably neurological so carefully went back over his x-rays and didn't see anything. Then he went down his back with his fingers feeling every bone.  When he would get to one place, more than once, Morris would cry out but yet nothing shows up on the x-rays. Morris did one of his running jumps up on my desk last Tuesday, a paper slid and he fell back on the floor making lots of noise so I knew he hurt.  Then the next day, he was limping really badly and this all started. He said he sees this a lot in dog, especially small ones, and they have the same symptoms as Morris does. Cats are more agile so he doesn't see it as much. The vet is going to put a strong pain patch on Morris and see what happens. He says that he is having 100% success with the 18 dogs he has sent to a woman who does animal acupuncture and avoided surgery for the same type of injuries.  However, they have never tried it on a cat but he was going to call the acupuncturist and talk to her about Morris. O.K. you can quit laughing now...... 8-) Sure was lonesome last night without him around.

My Back: The doctor's nurse called me yesterday on my MRI results. I printed the report out and am totally clueless as to what all the problem is.  Basically the L4 is not sitting properly on the L5 causing a bulging disk and narrowing thus irritating the nerves in the spine. I tried to look up some of the terms they used and don't get much information so will wait until I see the doctor and get simple English explanations.  My PCP doctor is referring me to a Pain Management Doctor at the Spine Clinic that he goes to for his neck. They called today and I have an appointment with the pain doc on August 16th to find out options, etc.
I am just amazed that these KU Med doctors who read X-Rays, CT Scans and MRI look for more than just the specific issue the test was done for. The one was to look at the heart and also scanned the lung because it was on the picture thus finding the tumor in the lung. This time, he was to look at the spine.  However, he also looked at everything and found a lesion on the left nephrectomy bed which is the area where the missing kidney would be.  It could be a blood clot, "fat infiltrated scaring" (whatever that is) or just bad scaring, etc and he recommends a CT Scan with contrast dye to check it out. The surgeon who took my kidney out told me later that I did have a lot of scaring around the kidney area from the hysterectomy I had in 2001. He said "we had to chisel the kidney out of the scar tissue" plus more would have formed after they took the kidney out.  So, I'm hoping that is all it is.  The problem is that I can't do contrast dye without kidney doctors being involved because it is hard on kidneys and I only have 1 to get the dye out of the system. I have an appointment on Aug 21st to get set up with a local kidney doctor so will discuss it with her.  It just doesn't stop......

Monday Misc for July 28th

Morris Update: After a weekend of watching his behavior, I called the vet this morning and took him back in. He drinks very little, doesn't eat much, won't even eat tuna and his favorite ice cream so I KNOW he is really not feeling good. He is also constipated, still limping, can't jump and at times is in obvious pain. So.....he is staying in the hospital, probably overnight, where he is getting flooded with fluids via IV and getting a neurological checkup. He did another set of x-rays and there is stuff in the intestines/colon that hasn't moved much since Friday. We don't know if there is a stomach problem that makes it painful to move or if there is a nerve problem that is affecting the whole back part of his body - legs, hips, intestines included. So for the first time in 7 years, I am in the house without him and won't have him sleeping on my legs at night...... I feel like the biggest responsibility Larry left me with was his cat.... 8-)
Postponed Trip:  I had planned to drive east to Boonville, MO this morning, stay overnight and come back tomorrow.  This afternoon was going to be spent being a tourist at some of the old, little towns along the Missouri River that Lewis & Clark spent time at.  In the morning I was going to take a tour of Warm Springs Ranch which is where the Budweiser Clydesdales are bred, raised and trained. You have to make reservations for the ranch and it took me 5 weeks to get a ticket for a morning tour.... Another time..... 
Hot Water Heater: Friday morning the water in the shower wasn't as hot as usual but I was in a hurry and didn't think much about it. So...Saturday morning I go to take a shower and there was nothing but COLD water....  I called the office after they opened and they deemed it "an emergency" thus dispatching a maintenance person on the weekend. He came out later in the day and it was just a tripped switch on the heater which is electric. There are two of them and one of them had tripped. I had already checked the fuse box and knew it wasn't that when I called them.   I was reminded again how wonderful it is to not be a homeowner!

Voices from 2010

Back in Sept 2010, Larry and I did our first major road trip in which we visited New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas and then home. Most of the time we were just being tourist but visited my family in Missouri and some distant relatives of Larry's in Kingman, Kansas that I found on the internet. I spent several hours one afternoon interviewing my brother on audio tape getting some history on my family and his own history - childhood, where he was when, etc. I finally got around to transcribing the tape this week - 4 years after it was made. There were 3 channels on my little audio recorder and his was on channel 2.  However, before I discovered that Bill was on channel 2, I started to play it back and the recorder was on channel 3, last one used,  which was an interview I did with a relative of Larry's. Imagine my shock when I heard Larry's voice on the recorder chatting with Wilma Hovan, whose mother was Larry's grandmother's sister.

Needless to say, I was stunned! It is one thing to see pictures of a loved one who has died but it is quite another to hear their voice 4 years later. I didn't listen to it but quickly turned it off and found the channel where the interview with Bill was. About 1 hour into the interview, I hear Larry asking Bill a question and that happened several times during the interview. I got through the transcription of Bill's interview but have not tackled the one with Larry's relative when he talked a lot and asked her questions and she wanted to know about him. I would like to get it transcribed so I can add the info to his Family History book but I think it is going to have to wait a few months until I am ready to deal with the voice. Emotional. Sad. But yet it also brings back good memories of the wonderful trip we had that summer which was the first time Larry had ever been to the Midwest and then couldn't wait to get back to Arkansas.

Tuna Soup Medicine

I think we are making progress in getting Morris to feeling better!  Of course he hated me this morning after I gave him his 2 syringes of medicine and he immediately made a beeline for under the middle of the bed where I couldn't reach him. He jumped up on the bed last night on his own and was in the window when I got up this morning so there is some improvement.  For the first time in several days he walked all the way into the office a little bit ago and I set him up on the desk to help me after an appropriate amount of ear scratching - he decides how much is appropriate. He still isn't eating or drinking like he used to but he does love his "tuna soup".  I slide the dish under the bed and he drinks all the tuna water but doesn't eat much of the tuna.  Then I add some more water before putting it back in the frig so the water will soak up the tuna flavor. It's much easier when the patient can talk!  Now me getting down on the floor is another story!  I didn't know how bad my knees were until I'm doing that several times a day....  I can get down but it's the getting back up that is the problem.

Morris Update

Back to the vet today but this time is was to a local vet for a follow up... Kinda like going to Urgent Care and then going to your regular doctor for a follow up.....  Anyway, this will be his new vet here and we both really liked him.  Kinda youngish and obviously loves animals.   He had the labs for Morris from Urgent Care and noticed that the labs indicate Morris has an infection of some kind.  When I commented that Urgent Care said they were normal, he showed them to me and it clearly indicated some of the values were above normal. Morris is also running a temperature.  He took x-rays of his back, hips and entire torso to look at lungs, etc. Bones are fine but there is a lot of swelling in the soft tissue of the back legs and some of his lymph glands are swollen so he thinks Morris has an infection of some kind. So I have a bottle of antibiotics to give him along with the pain meds and we go back in 10 days.  Since Morris isn't eating or drinking much, he wants me to get TUNA in water and give it all to him - water included even adding some water. Usually I drained the water off before giving the smelly stuff to him.   He says Morris will drink the water thus getting some water plus eat the tuna so he is getting protein. So I got some tuna, gritted my teeth when opening it, gave it to Morris and he lapped up the tuna water plus ate some of the tuna.  I also learned from him how to get a cat to open his mouth so I can squirt the medicine in.  However, first I literally have to drag him out from under the bed with my knees protesting every second I am down on the floor let alone getting up. His first thoughts are that the asthma/sinus problem Morris has is from a fungal infection he picked up in the desert. Hummmmmmm....... 

Poor Morris

Here is His Majesty pretending to be a new piece of art on top of the buffet in the dining room. However, last night I took him to the emergency room because he could barely walk, couldn't jump up on my lap, wasn't eating, etc. I had been noticing that he was having trouble jumping up on things for a few days and sometimes his right rear leg wouldn't quite make it. Normally he can jump 5 feet from a surface with no problem. Yesterday he was under the bed when I got home and wouldn't come out - usually he is waiting for me at the door to the garage since he hears the garage door go up. He finally came out about 6 hours later and could barely walk with something wrong with the rear right leg. He couldn't jump up on the recliner with me and when I picked him up, he was obviously in pain and cried out. He hadn't eaten all day and couldn't drink since he couldn't jump up on the toilet which is where he drinks. So.....off to the emergency room we went. Two hours and $332 later.... he was walking a little better but still limping, they couldn't find anything wrong with the leg. they did a blood draw for labs and I got 7 pre-filled syringes of painkiller to squirt into his mouth. They gave him one dose before we left and when we got home he drank out of a cup of water I put on the floor and ate some of his food. This morning he was a little better but still limping. I made an apt with a vet for tomorrow and will probably do an x-ray, another $220, if he is still limping. They called me at 6:30 this morning to let me know that the blood work was fine. Knowing it would make him feel better, I got him some of his very favorite Black Walnut ice cream this morning and he wolfed it down leaving the nuts on the plate. Then I lifted him up onto his favorite window sill when he was setting below it and looking up at it and he has been up there for a couple of hours now. We don't know if he tried to jump up on something, didn't make it and hurt his leg or what.  Time will tell..... Other than his atshma, this is the first time he has anything wrong with him in the 8 years he has lived with us.

Genealogy DNA.....Huh?

I first started researching my ancestors back in the mid-1990's when the only way to do it was by going to the Family History Centers and spending hours looking at images on microfilm - page by page as you turned the crank to advance the film. It was slow going and it didn't take long before your eyes starting glazing over....  Then along came Ancestry.com, Family Search and other web sites that were digitizing the images and creating a searchable index. Millions of records are being added to these site every month. Now I can go to one of these web sites, key in the ancestors name and a little info on them and if I'm lucky, by magic will appear several hits of documents with his/her name in them. Well at least that is the way it is for many people I look for. Now the new thing in genealogy is tracing your ancestors by DNA. I have done a lot of reading on it and have attended a couple of seminars on it but will be the first to admit that it is still too complicated for me to truly understand it.  Science is NOT my best topic....  However, here is what I do know.......  A male has the same Y-DNA that his father does as his father's father, etc back along the direct line of males. Men inherit their father's Y-Chromosome.  This is not the case for females and don't ask me why....  The test results go into a database that matches people. People who do a DNA test for genealogy usually either want to (1) find their ancestors or (2) confirm their ancestors. I was hoping for to confirm what I had found in Public Trees on the internet.

My brother agreed to swab the inside of his cheeks and let me submit his DNA.  Thanks, Bill!  I used the nations leader in this technology who had  an Arnold Project which is collecting DNA and using it to trace/confirm ancestors. The day after the results were completed, I received 2 emails - one from the administrator (JA) of the group and another from a guy (BMC) who manages his brother's file.  JA let me know that based on Bill's DNA, there is a 97% likelihood that they share a common ancestor within 8 generations. BMC's brother is a very strong match to Bill plus BMC has written a book on the Arnold line. The next step was to compare our Pedigree Trees to determine where the common ancestor is.  In both cases, it is with my 6th Great-Grandfather Thomas Arnold who was the first generation born in the US in 1648 after his father immigrated to Mass. from England in 1640. Thomas, the one born in the US, had 3 sons - Isaac, James and John. Bill and I are from the Isaac Arnold line while JA and BMC are from the John Arnold line. I got a list of 17 people whose DNA is a close match with Bill's indicating they share common ancestors. Interesting!!!!!!

Midwest & Desert Temperature

Yesterday was the hottest day yet here in KC.  At 5:30 p.m. the temp was 95 degrees with a heat index of 106 although the TV said the heat index was 110. In some ways I felt like I was back in the desert!  The difference is that in the desert you feel like you are walking into a dry sauna when you go outside and here it feels like you are walking into a steam sauna when you go outside. It was very humid yesterday - 50% at 5:30 p.m. plus there was very little breeze.  However, the humidity is down today and it is much cooler.  I'll still take the weather here........

Monday Misc for July 21, 2014

Branson: Vivian and I went down to Branson over the weekend and I had forgotten how horribly bad the traffic there is. Maybe it was because when I was there before it was in April during the week. This weekend, the only main street/highway through town was stop and creep because the traffic was bumper to bumper for miles.  There are very few stoplights so it is almost impossible to get out of a parking lot into traffic or make a left turn. If you haven't been there, think of the Strip in Las Vegas being 2 lanes with no stoplights.

The drive down, especially when you get into the hills, is really pretty. We went through an area where there are a lot of Amish people and this was one of them on the 4-line highway. We stopped at an orchard on the way home and got some great tomatoes, etc. In my opinion, Lone Star Steak House has one of the best steaks you can get and there is one in Branson so guess where we went for dinner on Friday and guess what I had.....

Great-Grandfather Arnold:  The search continues and I'm happy to report that progress is being very slowly made! I have gone about as far as I can go on him until I get the information back from the National Archives.  I'm starting on his father next - Micajah Arnold who was born abt 1811 in either Tennessee or Georgia but lived in Tennessee for a lot of years and moved to Arkansas sometime between 1840 and 1850 since he is in Arkansas on the 1850 census.

This is the first time I have ever mapped a person but he seemed a good candidate to start with. I think if you click on the map, it will be larger on your computer.....

Southwest Airlines: I get their weekly email covering fares that are on sale.  It is interesting to see the ones from Kansas City since I looked at Tucson's for so many years.  The big steal last week was a flight to Chicago for $67.00 one way.... Now I have no real desire to go to Chicago but it did cross my mind based on that fare. Larry saw a $29 fare from Tucson to Denver and said we couldn't resist it so we went to Denver for a few days.  After using our senior discount, the fare ended up being about $25 each way each person.

Powell Gardens

As I said other day, I have been wanting to go to Powell Gardens but was waiting for a cool day to do so.  So when Tuesday's high temp was forecast to be 70, then I decided to go and did.  As I'm SURE you remember from my post on it last summer, Powell Gardens is spread out over 915 acres and contains several distinct gardens with trails connecting the different gardens. The Island Garden is probably my favorite with over 200 water plants in the pools.

There is currently a display of sculptures in the garden created by Dan Ostermiller.  They are bronze, larger than life sculptures of animals. For instance, the elephant is 12' tall.

 

I asked a staff person what the "purplish flowers with cones on top" (lower left above) were called and he said "purple cone flowers". Well I gave him a look of disbelief and he laughed before saying that was the common name but the scientific name was Echinacea - the herb.

 

Top: Catapillar resting  on it's breakfast.  Bottom: Dragon Fly which I don't think I have ever seen up close before.  They are strange in that their wings are folded up over it's head when resting.

Misc pictures in the Farm Garden.

 

Yesterday's meeting with Doc

I spent a little over 30 minutes with my primary care physician yesterday afternoon in which we reviewed every one of the recent tests and have a plan for going forward.  He opened the meeting with "we keep trying to find something wrong with you and aren't having much luck".
Heart: Valves and pumping are just as they should be.  Yes, there is a lot of hard plaque in an artery but the blood flow is good so no need to do a heart catherization to look for % of blockage, etc. I can't get rid of the hard plaque but I can prevent more of it accumulating through "aggressive risk factor modification". Losing another 20 lbs would be nice but it much more important to maintain what I have lost and don't go back to my old eating habits.
Blood Pressure: I did a chart for 10 days of home numbers that I took at home and it definitely is high at times.  However, he doesn't feel that medication is warranted yet since it is not an every day occurence.
Lung: Leave the nodule alone since it is not cancer and be prepared to explain it every time I have a lung x-ray.
Liver (auto-immune hepatitis): Labs are still good so stick with the liver doc's plan.
Kidney: Labs are good but he is giving me a referral to the nephrology dept so I have one lined up before I might ever need one.
Back: He had said back in May when all of this started that we would deal with the lung and heart before getting to the back so now it is back time. He want's to do an MRI to see how far out of line the particular vertrabra is out of line, etc. Once we know that we can decide what to do if anything. It is a lot of pain, especially when I do any lifting, but is bearable so we will see. I'm learning a lot about back stuff from going to the doctor's appts with my brother and sister-in-law. All the doctors agree that I'm between a rock and a hard place since I'm should not be taking either Ibuprophen (hard on kidneys) or Tylenol (hard on liver).  I tried a pain killer and it just made me sleepy.  So....we agree that I will use Ibuprophen when I absolutely have to take something and monitor the kidneys closely. Tylenol just isn't very effective for me.
Always tired: The heart doctor thought it might be from the heart not pumping correctly but that isn't the case. I did a thyroid test yesterday and it that is normal then he wants to do a sleep study. He asked if I had sleep apnea and I said "I don't know, you will have to ask Morris"......  I guess that can make you tired, raise blood pressure, etc.
Summary: Basically I'm in pretty good shape!!!!!!!!!!

The new rankings was just released for hospitals and KUMed Center is ranked in the top 50 hospitals out of 5000 hospitals in 12 of their specialties.  The top 50 includes Mayo, etc. I continue to be amazed at their high level of patient care mainly due to the time the doctor gives you for your appointments.

Monday Misc.....

Vera Bradley's Sidewalk Sale started last Friday and ran through yesterday.  Yes, I was there when it opened on Friday standing in line waiting for a "go" from the staff along with about 100+ other people.  Yes, I bought things I didn't need but couldn't resist when they were $5-10 dollars ea. Yes, I bought the same style purse but in a different color to go with the 4 of the same style I already have. But it was fun, once-a-year event and now I am letting my credit card recuperate.

On Saturday morning early I went to the Overland Park Farmer's Market. I haven't been in a few weeks and was pleasantly surprised at what they have in season. EVERYTHING was grown by the farmer in the ground as opposed to hydrophonic tomatoes, etc. The tomatoes actually taste like tomatoes. This is the first crop of peaches and they were pretty good. Most of it is from the same farm that I got the strawberries from back in May.

 

Can't wait for the polar vortex that comes in tonight and drops our temperatures to fall numbers for a few days.  54 is forecast for in the morning with a high of mid-70's.  That is my idea of perfect weather!!!!!!  I have been waiting for a cooler day to go to Powell Gardens so am headed that way in the morning. They have a special exhibit that will only be there for a few more weeks.  That is the gardens that last year had the display of animals made of Lego pieces......

Thursday's This and That

I love these flowers!  One of the homes along the trail by the golf course has a bunch of these in their backyard next to  the trail.  I don't know what they are called but my mother always had them in her garden.  The plants are 3-4 feet high and the blooms are quite large.

I can remember gathering the seed from the blooms when I was a kid and putting them in an envelope so she would have seeds for the next year to plant. It is always a trip down memory lane when I walk by that particular house.

Morris has come up with a new "cave" for his afternoon naps and it is under the sofa.  He has a 4" high space between the floor and the bottom of the sofa to crawl in and then it is higher right under the sofa once he gets under there. It is really funny to watch him slither under there. The first time he went under there was when it was thundering in the evening and that was the closest place to get under since he was on my lap when the thunder hit.  I guess he liked it since he disappears under there during the day now.

I'm still on the trail of my Great-Grandfather Jefferson Arnold. Yesterday I found his muster rolls for the time he was in the Arkansas First Infantry - 1st Battalion in 1862 on the Union side. I also found some history on that particular unit but haven't had time to analyze the info yet. I spent so much time on Larry's genealogy because it was so interesting with his ancestors role in settling California.  My side was pretty boring until I found GGF Arnold and that opened up a very interesting chapter on my family.  Of course, once I get on the trail of something like this I spend hours and hours on it but that is what's fun about being retired!  Yesterday I took a step back to spend some time organizing what I have found. There is a wonderful Arkansas state genealogy library in Little Rock and I wish I knew then what I know now about my ancestors. I spent several afternoons at the library when we spent the summer there in 2011.  It's only a 414 mile drive, or 6 hours, to Little Rock from here........

Civil War's Battle of Carthage

I grew up in Sarcoxie, MO which is 20 miles SE from Carthage, Mo which was the nearest "large" town. I heard that there was a Civil War Battle in Carthage but never paid much attention to it growing up and even later. But all that changed  when I confirmed my paternal great-grandfather's name and then ran it through a web page of Civil War information just as a curiosity. Much to my surprise, his name was there along with his enlistment information, regiments he served in, info on his death and enough information on pensions for his wife and son that I can get his records from the National Archives. Now all of a sudden the Civil War is important to me! I remember my granny telling me when I was growing up that she had 2 brothers - one fought for the north and one for the south at the Battle of Pea Ridge in Arkansas. She never mentioned her father-in-law so I knew nothing about him until I found him recently.

My great-grandfather, Jefferson Luther Arnold, enlisted in the Arkansas Company D, 1st Infantry Battalion on July 1, 1862 and on August 29, 1864 he enlisted in the Missouri Company L, 11th Regiment Missouri Calvary. He died Dec 29, 1864 of small pox at a hospital in Brownsville, Arkansas.

Now to the Battle of Carthage.....  They have a really nice, small Civil War Museum in Carthage and outside of town is the Battle of Carthage Historic Site where the battle was fought.

The docent at the Museum was very interesting and knowledgeable.  I would like to talk to him again and ask more questions...  Besides the usual exhibits in a museum, they had a really interesting exhibit listing the various reasons for the Civil War in Missouri and it not being all about slavery. Even though many residents of Missouri and Arkansas were supporters of slavery because they were from the Confederate states, it was more than just slavery.  Another reason was to control the Trails to the Frontier and Trade. The wagon trails to the west left from Independence, MO that contained both cargo and emigrants moving west. The docent put it like this. "It wasn't just about slavery - especially in Missouri and Arkansas.  The South didn't like the North telling them what crops they could grow and that they couldn't have slaves. The North wanted the United States to remain one country and not let the South break away. Same things we hear people talking about today." He also talked about many, many of the solders dying of diseases without ever being wounded in battle.

The Battle of Carthage occurred on July 5, 1861 and was the earliest full-scale battle of the Civil War, preceding Bull Run in the east by 11 days. It involved more than 7,000 men, including infantry, artillery and cavalry and lasted an entire day. At issue was whether Missouri would stay in the Union or join the Confederacy. The Governor of Missouri wanted the 6,000 man Missouri State Guard to join the South. Sent to stop him were 1,100 German-American Union volunteers from St. Louis.

A mannequin of a Private, Third Missouri Volunteer Infantry, 1861. At this point in the war, the Union blue and Confederate gray had not been established.  Most of the Union troops were wearing gray and the Confederates were still in civilian clothes.

The battle started that morning 9 miles north of town and in late afternoon the Union troops started to retreat through the southwest corner of the Carthage Square containing the Courthouse.

The Jasper County Courthouse (right), as it appears today, is on the Carthage Square  was used as a field hospital. The Union kept firing but dropping back. Under cover of darkness they retreated to Sarcoxie, Mo and then on to Springfield. This was the first I ever knew that Sarcoxie played a part in the Civil War and I lived there the first 22 years of my life.

I started my journey at the museum with hopes of finding out if my great-grandfather fought in the Battle of Carthage.  However, I knew that wasn't the case as soon as I found out that the battle was fought in 1861 and his first enlistment was in 1862. I went downtown to the Kansas City branch of the National Archives this morning.  They gave me the forms and information on how to request his records. Hopefully the information will include where he was in the war. We shall see......

Reeds, Missouri

On Saturday, I drove my brother and sister-in-law down to Carthage, Mo which is about 135 miles south so they could attend her sister's surprise 85th birthday.  It gave me the opportunity to do some genealogy work I have been wanting to do so I dropped them off and then went wandering......  I went to the Civil War Museum and Battle of Carthage Battleground in and near Carthage.  Carthage was the closest large town to where I grew up but I really didn't know anything about their role in the Civil War and I will write that history lesson tomorrow.  However, I have also been wanting to go to Reeds, Mo which is where my mother and brothers were born. I recently discovered that a brother of my mother's and his wife plus my mother's only sister and her husband were buried in the Reeds Cemetery.

Top left: I worked my way over to Reeds from Carthage on back roads.  I wasn't sure where I was a few times but knew I was headed in the right direction and had a GPS app on my phone if I needed it. The drive was a very pretty  trip through farm land with Willie Nelson on the radio....

Top right: The sign for Reeds. I don't know exactly what the population was in Reeds when I was a kid but would guess it was around 3-400. The population was 130 in the 2000 census.  There is certainly not much there now but they do have a new post office.

Bottom: The Reeds Cemetery where 461 people are buried. I had no idea where the gravestones I was looking for were so it was a lot of tramping through weeds to find them.

 

Top: This is the Reeds school house where my mother attended and got her 8th grade diploma from the school in 1924.  I have the original diploma.....  The school has been converted in a home and some work is being done on it.

Middle: There are hundreds of acres corn in the area and it is in good shape this year due to all the rain they have had.

Bottom: I was so shocked to see that someone still hung clothes on a line that I had to take a picture. True Ozarks! 

July 4th

I made it through Vivian's Annual July 4th BBQ for the family. 44 family members spanning 4 generations - give or take a couple of people were there. It was a beautiful day - about 83 degrees with a light breeze.  The weather was certainly better than last year where it started storming and raining about the time we were ready to eat.

Pat, Vivian's husband, grilled 42 hamburgers and 40 hot dogs. The top picture is the main food and there was another table with deserts on it. My food contribution was the 10 lbs of strawberries that I sliced for the shortcake. The above bottom picture is one of 3 tables that was set up in the backyard and decorated. People also brought lawn chairs and were setting on those, on the deck and anywhere they could find to set.

People setting on the deck, Chef Pat, flowers and fountain with flowers on the deck, people setting out in the yard eating and the desert table. There was another area with cupcakes, cookies, etc on it.
It was a lot of work but fun. My feet have a year to rest up before next year.....
Some of the 30 something guys bought a bunch of fireworks and did a big show after it got dark. I hear it was a really good show but I was at home in my recliner by then getting lectured by Morris for being gone so long.

Another phone call from a doctor...

These doctors have got to quit calling me or I am going to get totally spoiled and expect such care from my doctors and we all know that doesn't happen....  Today's call went something like this: "Hi Darlene. This is Brenda, Dr. Anderson's nurse. (He is my primary care doctor.) Dr Anderson has received all of your test results and would like for you to come in so he can go over them with you. When would be a good time for you to come in. "  Well after I got over my shock of them calling, I suggested July 14th. "That works for us.  How about 2 pm and I have blocked out enough time that he will have time to answer questions, go over everything, etc with you". She also said something to the effect that based on the stress test, I do have problems but it doesn't indicate anything critical. I keep trying to figure out what the difference is with the doctors at KU Med center, of which Dr. Anderson is part of, and the doctors in Tucson. I got an email survey yesterday to do on my heart doctor and the questions were all about did he listen to me, how was his communication and was it easy to understand (non technical), did I feel rushed during my time with him, etc. I feel very blessed to have found such doctors.....