Not To Brag...

     ....OK, Yes, totally to brag

5 for 5 every challenge, every day this month on microsoft solitaire.

victory is mine
bring me the finest muffins and bagels in all the land

August starts a new challenge tomorrow

and, yes, my gamertag is Tangosdadee

Thanks, but no Tanks

     Today, Preferred Home Care came and picked up the Oxygen tanks and the Oxygen Concentrator-

my breathing is not perfect, but is better for now- I just have to make sure I use good posture here at the desk. I tend to hunch over and compress my lungs.

so:

• Breathe better
• good posture
• steroid inhaler to keep lung irritation at a low. 

     I have even been mostly off of albuterol since starting the symbicort

At the time of this posting... a whopping 91% oxygen saturation in my capillaries

A Little Info

     So I have been lax, and am just getting bck into the swing of things. There was the eye thing (still in the process of adjusting) but there was also another incident. I touched upon it here, but here is additional detail.

     On June 27th of this year, my lungs, never very reliable in the first place, betrayed me; I was taken in an ambulance, and I spent a night and part of the day in the hospital watching Tosh.0 and watching the charge on my cell phone diminish slowly,

     They wouldn't let me leave Sans Oxygen tanks. I went home with two tanks to await the arrival of three more and an "oxygen concetrator"

     This last Monday my GP gave me the go-ahead to send those back. I'm not recovered, but I am getting stronger by the day. My lungs are less inflamed, and I am using an inhaled corticosteroid to keep the asthma down.

it is also apparently for Lycanthropes: It's nice to see werewolves have good family time.

but I digress. So this coming Thursday, I get to wave 'bye to the oxygen tanks, and just focus on making my body do what it is told again

     Thanks for your patience. Thanks for my family, who helped me through Hospital and recovery.

     Some suggestions on how to have fun with this type of situation.

• ask the nurses if they can wheel you down to the morgue to shop for a replacement cornea
• suggest to the man who delivers your oxygen tanks that you will just refill them at a gas station airpump(they will freak out trying to tell you why tha is a bad idea)
• call the velcro straps I am using to keep the the O2 line coiled "oxygen pimps" because they keep the hose in check. 

Oh, and my internist at the hospital was about 80% of this man. He had the accent, the bald head, and the intense blue eyes. I happened to mention that to my nurses, and found that I was not the first to have voiced or considered that resemblence

The Titans Have Returned

     I'm always excited for new transformers- that being said I have also mentioned being dubious about Headmasters(or now "Titanmasters"). No need to restate that here, when you can just read or re-read the prior post.

    So I heard that this year was going to be all about Titanmasters with mixed anticipation and trepidation. Hasbro and Takara were going to headmaster characters who never were headmasters in the first place. So now that I have some of them in hand,...

Enough Said

     So I first ordered Sentinel Prime and Galvatron on July First, and they shipped from BBTS. In the meantime, I found Wheelie, Rewind, and Stripes at Walmart. Stripes and Rewind I am impressed with, they managed to make triple-changer cassettes, and they will hit these pages when I can post them with Blaster. 

     Wheelie...He was the Jar-Jar Binks of the 1986 transformers movie. He was a Kid appeal, character, an Orphaned and abandoned transformer child. And he spoke in rhyme. ABOMINATION!

So, I never had his G1 figure, ended up with the classics legends figure by happenstance, and got the GDO import Wheelie because he was on the peg and I had spare cash. Never a Wheelie fan. not Cartoon Wheelie, nor Bay Wheelie

     Hasbro got this right. He's awesome. My Friends at Pax Cybertron(who I am ecstatic to see back from Sabbatical) gave us a good video review

there is even room for a driver in here, or an accessory-

     So Wheelie arrived before Sentinel, so did Blurr. 

     Now I happen to have gotten a Blurr figure that I really like, and was happy with. I still am happy with it. But this version is an easy transform, and ridiculously fun. He has been on my desk every day for 2 weeks. has taken Overclocking's place on the classics shelf(moving Overclocking up to the masterpiece shelf- No tears, gentle readers- he is in a better place) Pax Cybertron again gave a us a good video review. His Titanmaster is Hyperfire

     Sentinel Prime was one I was excited about, and am pleased with. His shuttle mode kind of looks like the G1 Ark. His Titanmaster is Infinitus. Oh, and Galvatron will show up a different day

Fifteen cars, fifteen restless riders...

      Hardhead has hit this blog before, courtesy of Toyworld, but the Hasbro version has a ton of charm, too, His Titanmaster is Furos

I just wanted to show them my cannons...

One of the tricks of the Titan masters is that the heads are interchangeable, to give different looks and different abilities to the transformer. 

     Tango is waiting on Hasbro to release the Parrotmaster transformers. Maybe next year Tango...

Puzzles

     I love Puzzles, like I love Transformers- they stimulate the mind, give you something to solve, and something to focus different parts of your brain on.

     My two current favorites are a tablet game called Block Hexa Puzzle and Microsoft Solitaire Collection with it's five daily challenges. I am currently 5 for 5 every day this month, even on the sadistic and evil "solve this in this number of moves" challenges on free cell.

     Be good to your brain- feed it what it needs to work best, and exercise it. Don't face the world with a flabby brain.

Independence

     Independence is much on my thoughts today, Independence is very important to me. To be able to live on my own terms, doing what I need to in order to be happy.

     Free to collect and display toys, free to eschew anyone who disapproves, Free to tell wild stories, to fall down cultural rabbit-holes and clamber back out, a little wiser and a lot more disturbed.

     But that isn't independence. that is free will, and self confidence.

     The problem with independence is that independence is a myth. We are all connected to one another in this world, We all depend on one another, and sometimes we lean very heavily indeed. We measure ourselves by our fellow beings, we depend on them to be there for companionship, for compassion, and sometimes for better judgement.

     I need my Family, I need my friends, I need people I don't even know and haven't met for things I can't yet imagine. While I have been variously blind or suffocating, my sisters, parents, daughter, nieces and nephews have given me rides, or called, just to talk.

     We need our neighbors, or the stranger who tells you to step ahead in line because you are carrying three items and she is carrying 10. Or even just the guy who smiles and nods, acknowledging you are a fellow human

     Now, on to America. America needs it's neighbors. We need Mexico, Canada, Europe. We need the richness of other cultures so we don't stagnate, We need the competition of people who have gotten more proficient than us at something we used to excel at. We need other people.

     America is like a great big friendly dog. We want to be liked, so we come to you wagging our tail. It's hard for us to understand that we are WAY too big to be up on the couch, or on Aunt Ethels lap, We don't understand when you kick us, or brandish a rolled up newspaper. We just want you to love us. So when we get kicked, you get demagogues, and oligarchs, and theocrats, and America goes a little crazy for a while.

     And all the other nations need us. We all, every country, every person, need each other.

     Happy Fourth of July.

As an added bonus- I took a couple of pics of a couple of my favorite american icons. Hopefully I will have the juice for a full on photo set soon

Unreliable Pets

     A couple of weeks ago, my pet disappeared for a weekend- when he came back, he was behaving oddly, and not seeing well. 

     I put up with it, because that is the kind of being I am. Magnanimous.

     This last Monday, he made some cough-ey noises and disappeared again for a day. Now that he is back, he is tired and has a snake on his face, which he will not let me remove. 

     I blame Sam. I'm starting to regret letting him keep her. Sure, she amuses Cappy and the other birds, but at what cost? I can't have her interfering in our relationship. 

     Tango. 

       .....I found that as a new draft. Amazingly, my keyboard still has all keys. He must have really had a point to make.

     So Monday, I had a bad coughing fit, after a weekend of severe congestion. My color dropped severely, and Sam called paramedics. what they found in the emergency room was I was not getting enough air. No Pneumonia, just severely stressed lungs, likely because of irritant factors in the air and from a backed up pipe we had to deal with. So I am spending a few days on an oxygen concentrator machine and with oxygen tanks. to ease my lungs a bit. They gave me antibiotics, steroids, and hours of comedy central in the hospital with only scattered nurses and doctors to engage in conversation.

     So, Tango, I will try to be more reliable for you in the future.