Today James, Chess and I hiked in Santa Ysabel, close to Julian. It was a nice sunny and warm day, with a little bit of breeze – just perfect. We walked through two large meadows and I had to pick some of the beautiful flowers to bring home. The smell of the bouquet reminded me of summers in Norway and all the flowers I have picked during summer months. It brought a big smile to my face. We saw two large cow herds, hawks, a garden snake – that gave us bit of a scare before we saw what it was, a coyote – that Chess figured he could tackle – I’m very happy he was on a leash, an ex rattle snake – just the skin going into a hole that Chess found very interesting – seriously… and a mommy duck with several ducklings – again I’m very happy Chess was on a leash otherwise he would have said ducklings for dinner. Quite an exciting day. We got a good workout, hiking 5.5 miles and the equivalent of 27 stairs according to my health tracker app. It felt good to get my muscles going, my heart beating, many good deep breaths and some tan back on my skin. If this didn’t help me get rid of the blood cloths – nothing will. 

It is incredible to think that three weeks ago I had to sit down on the sidewalk just a few yards from our house because I got exhausted just walking the short walk around the neighborhood. I was quite tired at the end of the hike today as well and I was very happy to see the car when we returned to the parking lot. I’ve defiantly been in better shape, but I am so happy that I’m able to quickly gain strength. 

This has been a great weekend. Not only the hike today, but it started with a nice chat and some coffee with Carol in the front yard on Saturday morning. Followed by me finally getting motivated to clean the house again. It had been a while, so it took a while to get the dusty surfaces full of dog hair sorted out. That became the workout that day. Then we had a great couple of hours with Daiana and Brian sharing some spritz and wine in the front yard. It is so nice to be somewhat social again even if it has to be in the front yard and six feet apart. I’m glad we have a nice front yard and can hang out in the shade under our palm trees.

Tomorrow I need to get my nose swabbed again. Another Covid test to clear me for the laparoscopy on Wednesday. My surgeon laughed and called it the wasabi test. It is definitely not a pleasant test getting a swab stuck as far up the nose as possible. But gotta do it. Now the timer in the kitchen is telling me it’s dinner time.