Now, and in 1989

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I don't often post pictures of myself. This blog isn't so much about me as it is about France. Anyway, on the left above is me today. On the right is me in a photo that was taken in 1989. I was 40 years old.

Walt and I had left Paris (where we met) in 1982 to go live and find jobs in Washington DC. For a variety of reasons, we ended up leaving DC for San Francisco in 1986. In 1989, I was working as managing editor of a computer magazine in San Francisco, and Walt was in graduate school at Berkeley.

In 2003, after 18 years there, we left California for Saint-Aignan, in the Loire Valley in France. We're still here.

Everything is coming up...

...no, not roses, but cyclamens. In our back yard, I mean. I think the woman who sold us the house we've been living in since 2003 used to buy little pots of cyclamens to set out on her window sills and when they stopped flowering in late spring, she would just pull them out of their pots and throw them outdoors. We've never done that, but her cyclamens still come up here every year in wintertime.

I'm headed out to get a haircut at nine this morning. I quit going in for regular haircuts last summer, when I started feeling arthritic and got tired of my short hair. It's really long now, and I'm tired of that. Back in the 1970s, when I lived in Rouen for a year and then in Paris for two or three years, I always had long hair. I didn't want to spend my money chez le coiffeur because my pay was low. And long hair on men was in style.

Yesterday at the doctors

When I got to the maison médicale yesterday I learned that our médicin traitant (GP, ot primary-care physician) has simply changed his work hours. I don't know why. He no longer sees patients on Wednesdays. The doctor who saw me yesterday is a young woman who is described as a médecin remplaçant.

All went smoothly. She reviewed my file on her computer screen and I helped clarify some of the entries therein. Why I had one treatment or another, and when, for example. We talked about the arthritis I developed (or fell victim to) last summer. She examined me and said my heart is strong and my lungs too. That was good news.

However, she found my blood pressure to be slightly higher than it should be and advised me to buy a tensiomètre and test my blood pressure monthly or even weekly at first. There's a very complicated-looking form to fill out and return to the doctor. I can do that. In fact, we have a tensiomètre and we'll see how well it works Walt bought it in the U.S. on a trip last year. A new one costs as little as 20 euros here in France.

She also wrote me a prescription for Prednizone to treat my current arthritis flare-up along with a renewal of a prescription for an ointment that contains Ibuprofen. I told her I have some Ibuprofen tablets on hand but I'm not taking any right now and haven't felt the need to for several months.

My wrist joint inflammation seems to be less painful this morning. I don't know which doctor I'll see when I go back for other consultations this winter and spring. It might just depend on the appointments that are available and on which days. I'll definitely need to go back in about six months, as always. Or before, as need be. That's my status report.

Sunrise peaking... or is that "peeking"?

I'm going to move on now. Recently I've posted a lot of sunrise photos — mostly from January 2018. Tomorrow I have a doctor's appointment at 9 a.m., so I won't post. Then I'll try to figure out what to do next. My right wrist feels tired this morning. Maybe I've overdone it.