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Friday is a good day to mentally reflect on the past week and update the blog on some of the more gritty aspects of a dialysis life. So here’s some of the back stories in my life this week:

  1. Since reducing one of my blood pressure meds from 10 mg to a 5 mg dose, my blood pressure responded well and the last six mornings have been over the minimum of 90 over 60. Thursday morning it was 110/62, just about perfect. It appears we have this defugality resolved, at least for now.
  2. I have been having problems with my Abbott Libre 3 sensor. Recall this sensor provides me with real-time glucose readings to aid my diabetes control. Normally at night, I plug my phone into its AC charger on my desk in our study which is about 15 feet from our bed. Usually, the phone stays connected to the CGM and all is well. On rare occasions, the phone breaks connection, and the glucose reading goes down reaching the alarm stage of about 53. This causes my wife to get up and ascertain what the alarm is all about. She often wants me to chug orange juice to alleviate low glucose when in fact I feel fine and am not experiencing lows – no sweating and feeling it. The only way around this is to turn the phone off. This morning when I turned the phone back on the Libre 3 app informed me that my sensor had crapped out and to install a new one. This is two days before it was up for a normal last two-week replacement. From all of this, I ascertain that potentially there is something amiss with Libre 3 sensors.
  3. I fought the VA and I won! I have previously related that I had to travel to the Ft Worth VA audiology clinic to be fitted for new hearing aids. The doctor there stood up for me and as a result, I received notification that a civilian audiologist in Granbury would be providing me hearing aids with an appointment in March. Since one of my hearing aids is in for repair, I desired to move this up if possible. I called the civilian office and got an appointment for 1600 today in Stevensville, some 43 miles away. Although this is roughly the same distance as we are from Ft Worth VA, it is a pleasurable drive through the remote Texas countryside from our digs. What’s not to like?
  4. I spent some time last Saturday at our son’s new digs in the Palo Pinto TX area installing a new 5G Tp-Link Deco Mesh network system in his partially completed ICF (insulated concrete forms) home. He and his wife have now completed moved into the first floor/garage area from the trailer they were living in. His wife works from home and uses the internet heavily in her work as a graphic artist. As such, she requires as good an internet connection as she can get; the mesh network in connection with a T-Mobile 5G internet setup provided her on the order of a 150 Mbps down and 30 Mbps up connection which is more than adequate, even through the concrete wall of their digs.

The lead graphic was made using Poe with the prompt: “picture of the English shops selling “bits and bobs.” In England, Bits and Bobs equates to “this and that,” the subject of today’s blog.