Now that’s the Redford I know and love!

It was another glorious day here in Redford. On my way home at lunchtime, I stopped at Home Depot for the plants to go into the rail planter out on the front porch. I got two Vinca vines, one spike and two Dahlias.

I left them all in the garage so they wouldn’t bake in the sunlight. I ate more ribs and another ear of sweet corn for my lunch, washed up (messy food!) and then went back to work.

When I got home from work after 5:00 PM, I treated the cats, changed clothes and then planted the new arrivals. I watered the whole planter afterwards and then watered the tree hanging basket and the mailbox garden. There is a slight chance of rain overnight, but I can’t trust that and it’s supposed to sunny and hot with no rain for the next week or so.

I was still very stiff and sore from my weekend activities. But, there was one big thing I had yet to do. So, I pulled out the bed and leaned the very heavy top mattress up against the north bedroom wall. Then I did the same thing to the box springs.

Finally, I unbolted the headboard I’d made from the frame and leaned it up against the wall as well.

Since my last misadventure with the daybed sign on the mailbox, I decided to go back to my roots, so to speak. So, instead of signs or asking around, I carried the bed frame outside and set it near the road by the driveway. In order not to have to make tight turns, I pulled the car out of the garage and took the bed frame downstairs into the back room and then straight out through the garage to the road.

I noticed all the dirt on the garage floor that had been under the car. So before I pulled the car back inside, I grabbed the push broom and started sweeping it outside. I wasn’t half done when a pickup truck stopped and a guy began disassembling the bed frame and loading it up! That’s how it was in the good old days!!

I waved to him and yelled, “Bless you!” He called back, “Thanks, this is a nice bed frame.” He was right. I had bought a pretty expensive one, back in the day in St. Clair, when I first built my bedroom set.

Now, you may scratching your head and asking yourself, “What the heck is he up to, now?” In order to explain, we have to go way back to my motorcycle accident. Not only did I succeed in smashing my leg to smithereens, I picked up a nasty infection from the rotted stump. It was so bad they actually cut a window in my full length cast and, every so often, they would take out the window, cut me back open and scrape my bone, trying to eliminate it (along with daily shots at the doctor’s office and a visiting nurse who came on weekends with shots to the house on 24 Mile Road). At long last, they said it was either gone or dormant.

Based on that experience, I’m pretty much convinced that this spinal infection business is not over. And, from the description of how they would have to scrape my spine (going in from the front of my body, moving organs aside and amputating one rib) I’m also convinced that, should it reoccur, I will be laid up in far worse shape than I am now from my spinal fusion.

Since I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep since I left the hospital (where I could adjust the bed), my first thought was to buy a hospital bed. But, they are expensive and not exactly fashionable looking. So instead, based in part on my daughter Melissa’s recommendation, I bought an adjustable Craft-matic bed with one of those sleep number mattresses. They will be delivering it on Wednesday and taking my old mattress and box springs away.

While I’m at it, I might as well confess I bought another chair to replace the old lift chair that’s going to its new home this coming Sunday. Now, the reclining and lifting function worked fine, but it was very hard and uncomfortable, either because of its age or maybe that’s just how they made them back then. I used to have to sit on one pillow with another behind my back (I did tell the lady whose picking it up all this and she said her mother already sits on pillows, so it doesn’t matter and she still wants it).

It also did not fit with the décor in the living room at all (neither did the old blue leather recliner, come to think of it). I looked at recliners at Art Van and, for just a little more than the top of the line leather Lazy Boy recliner, I could get a new lift chair that was not only comfortable and fit in better with my other furniture, but, if I am correct and do end up laid up again, can also function to get me up on my feet. So, that’s the one I bought.

This all goes along with the philosophy “Hope for the best, but plan for the worst” that has always served me well over the course of my life.

Back inside, I tipped over the box spring and then the mattress. I must admit, just that little bit of height difference was really weird. It reminded me of the water bed I had back on Harrelson after Fran and I divorced (but without the wave action, lol).

I warmed up one of the “steaks” for dinner and had planned to make some Uncle Ben’s wild rice with it. But, when I looked in the cupboard, I didn’t have any!

[Note to self: Straighten up the damn cupboards!]

So, after some thinking, I ended up making some buttered noodles to go with it. It was a very good dinner!

I was beat and didn’t make it past 9:30 PM before I fell asleep.