Opening Day

[susandennis]

The Mariners play baseball today. Their first game. In Houston. At 6. I watched a little of the Yankee Nats game yesterday. I'm finding it difficult to get really jazzed about it all but I am interested so maybe it will grow on me. Maybe part of it is that it's been so long since the last game.

Now if my TiVo holds out. The damn thing rebooted 3 times last night in the span of an hour. I'm guessing (hoping) it's the hard drive. $150 will fix that. If it's something else, I'm in for way more $$. If it's the power drive, I could replace that but that is probably crossing the fix it/replace it line. I've ordered a new hard drive. And I do have the bedroom TiVo as backup. So no TV tragedy here. Yet.

I spent a fair amount of time about 6 months ago studying alternatives. If I stay with cable, TiVo is the only thing that makes sense. I stay with cable because that's the only way I can get Mariner games on TV.

But, if I'm willing to move my Mariner following to radio, I can dump cable (and save many $$) but then what? There is no other service that really interests me. You Tube TV comes the closest but I just don't like it and they raise the price about every other month. So I come back to cable and TiVo. Fingers crossed that this one lasts til the new hard drive gets here and the new hard drive fixes it.

I had a weird thing happen yesterday afternoon. I had been sitting a lot and not moving just out of laziness. But I got up to go get a package and then did some other stuff around the house and was seriously breath shy. I was panting and could not catch my breath at all. It's happened before, happily not often, and it's horrible. It feels scary and uggy.

Always before it's been part of an extended illness or some other CPOD exacerbation that has gone on for days and days. The only thing I could think was that this was the start of a bout of breathing shit that was going to be long and bad and I was so bummed. I took a couple of hits off my rescue inhaler (which never ever helps anything) and sat down to be miserable. And then got distracted.

And then, about 15 minutes later realized that 1. I could breath fine and 2. I felt great. WTF? Seriously, all gone. No more issue. I even got up off the couch and walked around the condo to make sure. Yep, all fine. A totally new experience but I'm not turning it down.

This morning's walk was fine. So. Yeah! COPD is degenerative and I've had it now for nearly a decade to I'm very lucky to be doing as well as I am and I'm grateful. I know it won't last but, hey, smoke 'em if ya got 'em... No, wait. That's exactly how I got into this pickle in the first place!

The yarn shop that stocks my favorite yarn at the best price has finally opened up shipping to the US again. On the one hand, YEAH! On the other hand... do I need to spend more money? nope. Do I need more yarn. nope. Sigh. But, they have all the colors...

Today I might do a little laundry. I have some house re-arranging I want to do. Move this lamp there and that one here and put that piece in storage/goodwill and clean up that clutter, etc. Nothing big, just tweaks.

My electric bill landed today. As expected, staying cool is pricey but, actually, not as bad as I expected. Next month will be the killer and then it will back to below reasonable. I use way less than normal in winter so I'm perfectly fine with my big fat but oh so cool Summer environmental footprint.

Ooops Just noticed Biggie's down to about his last kibble. Time to fill up his food tree and go brush my teeth. Those two are not connected but as long as I'm getting up anyway...

Comments

[bill-schubert.livejournal.com]

I can't remember. Do you see a respiratory therapist? Dana is moving into your category where she has a day or two she can't breathe. She does not have COPD or Allergies or asthma but has the symptoms and medicine for all three and still has days she's just in bed all day. So I'm trying to find a solution.

[susandennis]

oh! sorry to hear that. and, nope on respiratory therapist for me. So far, my exacerbations have all been connected to something so I can fix them - prednizone and time. And then back to regular me. Until yesterday, which was a much more simple fix.

i see a lung specialist (dr or nurse practioner) every year and that's it.

no one has ever suggested respiratory therapy and i'm thinking that could be because that wouldn't fix what i've got.

[runeshower.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I'm not sure about baseball, but we've been getting our Sharks hockey fix via Sling Blue. We cut the cord on cable about 2 years ago. Sling is SO much cheaper, and for an extra $5/mo comes with 50 hours of DVR so we can record the games and watch them at our leisure.

I just checked Sling's website: "If you're new to Sling TV this season, select MLB games are on NBC Regional Sports Networks, which are available in select markets with our Sling Blue service." You'd have to see if Seattle's on their list of "select markets". We were lucky that San Jose/Bay Area WAS on the list of select markets for hockey.

[susandennis]

Trust me. I have thoroughly examined the Mariners TV availability 8 ways to Sunday. It's not on Sling or YouTube TV or MLB (from here) or any other streaming service available to me.

I was part of a Sling trial not long ago and I have to say that I was not particularly impressed. Next to Tivo/cable, it was not nearly as user friendly or offer as many options. Cheaper yes, but the package was was smaller, too. Not for me.

[mairi-dubh.livejournal.com]

Interesting!
Not surprising, though, at least not too surprising.

I had a back injury about...twenty -two years ago, I think...and it took the longest time to "resolve " (rather than "heal?")
But from time to time, it'll act up, the pain so sharp it can make me gasp and want not to inhale.
I discovered that if I were either angry or at least mighty cranky about something specific and having an adrenaline rush because of it, or if I were distracted by something particularly interesting (to me ), the pain would vanish, much, I imagine, as you've reported.

Dr. Norman Cousins talked about the power of the mind (or the emotions) in one of his books, describing removing a "something" from his patient's back but being so engrossed in the conversation he and the patient were having that he forgot to administer the local anesthetic, and the patient never felt a thing.

[carriea31.livejournal.com]

As soon as I started reading the breathing situation, I wondered about the possibility of any connection with your new swimming place. I don't even want to tell you I thought that, but if there is any connection and i hadn't mentioned my thought, I'd feel like a jerk.

[susandennis]

nope. i thought the exact same thing. exactly. immediately. the only thing is that last time, i had breathing problems while i swam and so far none of those.

tomorrow is another swim day. i'll feel a lot better about it all when i get to the end of that hour with no issues :)

[siglinde99.livejournal.com]

Life is too short to knit with crap yarn. Conversely, life is too short not to buy and enjoy good yarn in all the colours. Add it to your display shelves and claim it is decoration until you are ready to use it.

[susandennis]

yes yes yes!

[richaarde.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid of what my next power bill is going to be. I've been home for much of the past month, and the heat and humidity have been brutal so I've been running the AC nearly constantly.

[susandennis]

i was afraid to look and afraid not to.

[sleepybadger.livejournal.com]

I sometimes feel like we're some of the last people to still have cable, but Zen loves it for football and I still like just flipping through the channels, plus we have it all hooked up with our netflix account and whatnot which makes it so hard to back out of.

Glad your shortness of breath was short-lived! Woo! I'm asthmatic so I get it. Some days I feel so damn wheezy and I don't have any idea why (though sometimes it's because I've been forgetting to take my maintenance meds). And of course these days I'm thinking "Covid???"

NOw that we have fully functioning AC I expect our electric bill will be terrible but i don't care because it's so glorious to be cool.

[susandennis]

At least there's two of us not cutting the cord :)

So funny, COVID is my last thought when I'm short of breath. I do worry that I'll be panting behind my mask and someone else will think I'm typhoid Mary!

Cool is so glorious.

[howeird]

Replace the tivo hard drive? Maybe I should do that. My Roamio has recorded shows without audio, and rebooted in the middle of another one this week. Last years I tried a Bolt, but it was horrible.

[susandennis]

Years and years and years ago, when TiVos came with hard drives the size of diskettes, I found these guys and got a bigger 'boat'. I was going to send my unit to them to upgrade but they convinced me I could do it myself and they were right and I felt so smart. They have upgraded their service - so that now all the hard drives come formatted and ready to plop in. Their website is so old that it crackles but they know their shit. https://www.weaknees.com/

[rsc.livejournal.com]

We're kicking ourselves because we stayed in yesterday afternoon to watch the entirety of a completely forgettable Red Sox-Orioles game, when the weather and the tides were perfect for a canoe trip we've been wanting to make all summer. Today looks like it will be too windy, and after that it will be close to two weeks before the tide cooperates again, and who knows if the weather will. Stupid baseball.

[susandennis]

Yes. I totally get that. Of course, the Mariners have so far played like... well, Mariners so it's kind of a nothing to see here, just move along situation so far. We could, of course, still win 58 games but...

Sorry about your canoe weather.