Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Love this time of the year at home

November 3. I have been trying to remember when it was last year that we thought it was cool enough to not have to run the aircon all the time. I was hoping it was coming up but i am thinking it must have been in January. It is very hard to cook because it takes two hands to do most things. Dad is good to help. I can not sweep very well either as the brooms are so short you have to bend over to sweep. Bending over hurts quite a bit because it causes my arm to shift, so Dad has to do the sweeping also. We don't have a vacuum (nobody does here) so everything is swept. It also hurts to spit in the sink from brushing my teeth and washing my face because I have to bend over to do that also.


Mendero Hospital

Emergency Room

I got my staples out on Friday. It looks like it healing pretty well. I was concerned with the sanitation where they took the staples out. They had a tray that had old news print down on it that they gathered up and threw away before they started to remove the staples. they didn't put anything else down on the tray and it didn't look real clean so I was a little nervous. The nurse dug through a bin to find the staple remover. I watched carefully to see if they were sanitized. She did take them over to another area and it looked like she may have dipped them in some alcohol. I was glad to see that she didn't set them down anywhere. When finished she put the staple remover back in the bin with all the other tools that she had taken it out of without cleaning it. She put the gauze and staples in the garbage that had no liner in it. Cleanliness is kind of important to me so I am glad I didn't have any other procedures there. 

There is a store here, near where I get Physical Therapy called S&R that is very similar to Sam's Club back home. They even carry some Kirkland products. I was able to find some gel Vitamin E capsules that I am going to use on my incision hoping I don't get such a huge scar.  
Arm is still very swollen

I go back in two weeks for xrays to see how the bone is mending.  Each day I do better and better. But still get pretty tired at the end of the day. My arm hurts after the visit to PT especially in the night but I can see that it is helping so I don't have frozen joints.

We had a good special broadcast by Elder Oaks on Sunday evening. He was the Area Authority here 10 years ago. He definitely understands the challenges of the Filipino people. He counseled the people not to divide their family up by working over seas. He also talked about the young people working while going to school. The young people think that if they are going to school they shouldn't get a job. He also counseled them to work hard and not rely on others for their support. He encouraged the members to become self reliant.

 It was All Saints Day and All Souls Day this weekend. So the traffic was horrendous. People everywhere and vehicles going every which way on the roads. The Filipino people celebrate by going to the cemeteries and cleaning the tombs, visiting and eating with family. Many stay overnight at the cemetery. Our neighbors had family over for the weekend and they stay up late visiting, drinking and eating outdoors. The men sleep outside on the benches and snore up a storm. It gets pretty noisy with their snoring but is sort of funny to hear them.
Broom Shop. 
 The brooms in the bin on the right in the top picture and on the left in the bottom picture look a lot like 
the witches brooms I saw in the Halloween pictures. Here they are actually used and not a costume.
They use the stiff brooms to sweep outside with. The more fan shaped broom are for indoor sweeping.  
I like that they are colorful. We sometimes buy our broom from children who are out peddling them on the 
streets and at the gas stations. They don't last long so we have to replace them now and again.

Another broom shop. They are all along this road. When you look down the
side streets you can see the broom straw laid out in the road drying.



2 comments:

  1. Mom it is freezing, freezing cold, here tonight, I promise you are not missing much this week, I'd take tropics over the cold I think. Your arm still makes my tummy turn, I'm glad to hear you are still improving and feeling better and better. Love you

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  2. Hope you keep healing. Not a fun looking or sounding recovery.

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